"Is everything ready?" A firm, hoarse voice cut through the silence, echoing across a vast hall of polished black walls and golden pillars that rose until they vanished into the shadows of the vaulted ceiling.
The owner of that voice was clearly an elderly man, his aged body wrapped in luxurious robes embroidered with gold thread, the heavy fabric draping over shoulders that still held an imposing posture.
His hair, long and white as freshly fallen snow, cascaded down his back. Atop his head, two horns of the same color rose gloriously, curving backward like blades of ivory.
It was a dragon.
"I believe so," another elder replied, this one with hair of a strangely pink hue, his eyes of the same color shining with an ethereal calm.
He was a subordinate of the Primordial Empress of the Celestial Will.
"Very well." The dragon elder nodded, turning slowly to those acpanying him, his gaze sweeping over every figure gathered in the hall.
"This is a rescue operation. The young Miss Rou’er is in an ideal location, one capable of withstanding the full extent of our power, but even so, we must exercise restraint."
"The sole objective is to retrieve her, ensure her safety, and then return."
In all, there were forty-one: twenty followers of the Celestial Will, twenty warriors of the draconic people, and, finally, a solitary observer, the son of the Primordial Emperor of the Golden Sun.
Theoretically, he was there only to observe and assist the operation in a friendly manner.
In practice, however, he had been sent by his own father—a lecherous pig who already kept tens of thousands of concubines in his harem—to check out Rou’er’s beauty.
The Primordial Emperor of the Golden Sun had always harbored an interest in her mother.
However, after losing a hand to Long Wujin, son of the Primordial Empress of the Dragons, and nearly having his throat ripped out by the Empress herself, he ended up retreating with his tail between his legs.
Now, with the chance that the daughter of the former Maiden of the Celestial Will might return, it was only natural that the old pig would launch yet another assault—this time on the heiress.
Neither the Primordial Empress of the Dragons nor the Primordial Empress of the Celestial Will was pleased with this, but both chose, for the time being, to simply ignore it.
After all, if he dared to do something he shouldn’t, all they’d have to do was kill his father.
The Primordial Empress of the Dragons, the strongest among all the monarchs, had been looking for a reason to finish him off for quite some time anyway.
She had already crippled him once, but Primordial Emperors were capable of recovering from virtually any injury.
When she tried to finish him off for good, seven other Primordial Emperors intervened.
She killed three of those seven right then and there, and the other four were still recovering from their injuries to this day.
Since then, her every move had been closely watched by the other of the 36 Primordial Emperors, and many would have no qualms about gathering in groups of dozens to try to contain her if she acted without justification.
"You don’t need to worry about a thing, old man! I, Huang Yaori, will make sure everything goes smoothly! I just hope no vermin from the lower heavens show up to get in our way. I don’t want to waste my time beating up nobodies."
The dragon elder’s face darkened with displeasure at being called "old man," but in the end, he merely let out a weary sigh.
Of course, he wasn’t exactly incapable of responding either.
"If the young lady suffers even a scratch because of you..." the elder began, letting a wisp of his aura escape—a subtle yet suffocating pressure that thickened the air around them like tar.
"The Primordial Dragon Empress will bind you and your father together and whip you until she strips all the flesh from your bodies."
"How dare you..." Huang Yaori’s defiant words caught in his throat.
He swallowed hard, his arrogance crumbling beneath the weight of the elder’s icy gaze.
He remembered, ten thousand years ago, the last time his father had clashed with the Primordial Dragon Empress.
It had taken his father over three hundred years to recover, and those heart-wrenching screams of pain still echoed in Yaori’s mind.
In the end, he simply fell silent, averting his gaze.
"Let’s ensure the young lady’s safety as quickly as possible. She is in the middle of a bloodline awakening ritual, and, in total, we’ll have to wait ten minutes before we can return."
The voice of the Elder of Celestial Will echoed coldly through the hall, his pink eyes fixed on Yaori without blinking even once.
"If we take longer than fifteen minutes, the portal will close, and we’ll be trapped in that wretched place for the rest of our existence."
Everyone nodded silently, following the two elders to the far end of the hall. There, ten of the most renowned formation masters from across the Land of the True Gods worked tirelessly, their hands dancing in precise gestures over a massive luminous seal drawn on the floor.
It was time to bring the Maiden of the Celestial Will back to the place from which she should never have left!
Meanwhile, in the secret realm of the Cosmic Void Sect...
’The Maiden of the Celestial Will...’ Qingyi repeated in his mind, his eyes fixed on the golden characters that still pulsed softly in the sky.
Where had he heard that name before?
[This was the ancient title of Rou’er’s mother. Rou’er’s grandmother is the Primordial Empress of the Celestial Will.]
"Ah!..." Qingyi’s eyes widened for a brief moment, realization striking him like a bolt of lightning.
So the formation had, in fact, been able to identify Rou’er’s true lineage.
He had no idea how that was possible, but for now, he swallowed his curiosity, his gaze drifting toward the delicate curve of Rou’er’s back.
The process of awakening her lineage had already begun. Qingyi could sense, enveloping her body, a strange Qi gradually resurfacing—dense and ancient, something that seemed to have lain dormant for ages.
He raised his hand toward her and, for a brief moment, felt his own Qi slip from his control, as if something greater were pulling him toward that strange flow.
Surprised, he withdrew his hand, lips curving into a slight smile.
Able to take full control of other cultivators’ Qi... was this Rou’er’s lineage?
He had never, in his entire life, seen anything like it.
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