Chapter 132: Formation’s Heart

The human heart contained many emotions – love, hatred, sorrow, and happiness. When negative emotions like fury, remorse, resentment, jealousy, killing intent, greed, and so on invaded the heart, one would turn cynical and even desire the destruction of the world.

For many people, during moments of extreme dejection, they would suddenly question – why did they have to live? This world was truly too disgusting. For the great majority of the time, this emotion was short-lived; this sort of negative thinking could be tossed to the back of the mind with a nap or a bath, to arise only at the next time one was unhappy.

This sort of emotion vanished in a blink of an eye, but the gloomy qi borne from it still remained in the Heavens and Earth. It was precisely this anger, greed, and despair generated by humans themselves that the Worship of Ten Thousand Yao formation exploited to reach completion.

More than five thousand years ago, the yao world gradually waned in power. A rumor arose during that time, stating that the yao world would be welcoming its strongest emperor who would lead the yao race to new horizons.

This rumor had disappeared along with the great yao and was gradually forgotten by the yao cultivators. Even among the yao cultivators who survived the ancient era, the majority of them did not take this rumor to be true.

The yao race prized strength above all else, but it didn’t need a yao emperor.

Fu Li could hear many voices – happy ones, sorrowful ones, desperate ones, and hopeful ones. A colossal voice filled with despair and pain was calling out to him, waiting for him to save it.

My emperor, we are awaiting your awakening.

Who are you?

We are your people.

Tortured souls wailing in anguish stretched as far as Fu Li could see. Their facial features were distorted, their souls incomplete. Unable to reincarnate, their only fate was for their soul to slowly dissipate in the stream of time.

Fu Li felt their wrath and unwillingness as if it belonged to him. He hated the unjust heavenly law and hated the humans who were clearly weak yet occupied the earth.

The yao race absorbed the essence of the sun and moon and cultivated a long-lived body with much difficulty, and now they had to voluntarily drop dead just because heavenly law needed the humans to prosper?

Unfair!

This was unfair!

How hateful, how hateful!

He wanted… these humans to kneel and worship the yao race, to be enslaved by the yao race for generations upon generations.

Zhuang Qing realized that the Fu Li in his arms had opened his eyes, his body of fiery fur so gorgeous that it was a little ominous.

“Dragon?” Golden pupils stared at Zhuang Qing. There was no emotion in his eyes, as if he merely viewed Zhuang Qing as an underling who only needed to crawl by his feet.

The unease in Zhuang Qing’s heart intensified as he gazed at Fu Li in his embrace. His expression was alien to him. Pressing down his heart that was jumping about lawlessly, he asked, “Fu Li, what’s wrong with you?”

This one palm of his was not light. Zhuang Qing took two to three steps back, forcibly swallowing the blood that gushed up his throat. Maybe he hadn’t swallowed blood but thousand year old ice, otherwise why would his heart be this cold?

A few hours ago, they had still been looking forward to seeing what their celebratory clothes looked like, how many guests would be present at their Dao Bonding Ceremony, and how many banquet tables they would need to set up. So why had things turned out like this?

The heart of the formation was still absorbing the spiritual qi of the Five Elements in the Heavens and Earth. Ominous qi grew thicker and thicker in their surroundings. Almost four-fifths of the sky had already darkened.

Several rays of light flashed across the sky. Those from the management bureau with higher cultivation had already rushed over. Taking the lead was not Ning Xuan or Chao Yun, but Gong Fu and the Kunpeng, who freeloaded from the management bureau without doing any work.

Gong Fu and the Kunpeng had such ugly complexions that the sky seemed like it was about to collapse. Expressions of terror and disbelief decorated the faces of Song Yu, Chu Yu, and the other yao following behind them.

Chu Yu was worried after discovering that Fu Li wasn’t beside Zhuang Qing. “Boss, where’s Fu ge?”

Zhuang Qing didn’t pay any heed to him. Taking out his natal sword, he went in pursuit of Fu Li.

“Don’t go,” The Baize held Zhuang Qing back. As an elder who loved Fu Li dearly, he might wear a heavy expression but was better able to accept this matter than Zhuang Qing. “He’s already awakened, you can’t touch him.”

Zhuang Qing pushed the Baize’s hand away, his gloomy eyes directed at him. “You’re too calm for an elder.”

The management bureau people who had just rushed over were somewhat confused. Seeing the surging undercurrent between Zhuang Qing and Fu Li’s elder, even more so did they not dare to speak. Those with more courage turned towards Gong Fu in search of answers. Gong Fu shook his head, not uttering a single word as he watched Fu Li slowly approach the heart of the formation in the distance, his expression one of sadness and sympathy.

The fate and ending of certain yao were foreordained from the moment of their birth. Even before the Hou had arrived on this earth, Father had foreseen that its birth would send waves of shock through the world.

Not only was the Hou capable of moving mountains and flattening the sea, what was scariest was his innate ability to corrode. As long as he willed it, any living creature that came in contact with him would burn to a crisp in a mere blink of an eye.

A yao beast who could bring about destruction from birth was doomed to not be auspicious, it could only be a… fiend.

“What’s Fu ge going to do?’ Ning Xuan, who had rushed over in a flurry, recognized Fu Li from the back. He had simply not dared to recognize him for a moment because Fu Li’s walking posture and his qi differed from usual.

Unfortunately, no one answered his question.

“If you touch him now, you will become like that Feiyi’s ancestor and turn to ashes under the sun,” The Baize pointed at the shrubs that had withered to ashes beneath Fu Li’s feet. “Nothing can escape the Hou’s ability to destroy.”

“Hou?!” Chu Yu stared blankly. “What’s a Hou?”

Wasn’t Fu ge a rabbit yao? Why had things suddenly turned so strange? Also, the Feiyi from Hunxi Mountain had once said that his ancestor had turned to ashes all of a sudden. But no yao cultivator outside of their management bureau knew of this matter. Based on the occupational standards of the management bureau’s staff, it was impossible for Fu ge to have told his family’s elders about it, so how had this elder come to learn about it?

The crux of the matter was… why did this elder say that Fu ge was connected to the Feiyi’s ancestor turning to ash? According to the Feiyi’s statement, the Feiyi who had turned to ash had lived approximately more than three thousand years ago. Fu ge couldn’t have been more than a few hundred years old at that time, how could he have done such a thing?

The ground suddenly shook violently, as if something was about to break through the earth.

Zhuang Qing stared at the small cracks that had split open on the ground. His sword shot over abruptly, an intense golden glow shining at the tip of the sword. The yao beast who had just shown half its head found itself dropping down.

“Who is it?” The yao beast was in a rage. Shoving aside the surrounding mountain stones, it let out a furious roar. This yao beast had the body of a leopard, two horns on its head, as well as thick dragon qi.

The yao beast scanned its surroundings and saw Zhuang Qing with a sharp sword in hand, ready to attack. But when he caught sight of Gong Fu standing not too far behind Zhuang Qing, half his anger instantly dissipated.

“Gong Fu?” Seeing Gong Fu’s weak dragon qi and his even weaker auspicious qi that bordered on pitiful, delight at Gong Fu’s misfortune could be seen on his face. “And I thought you’d died long ago, I didn’t expect you to still be dragging out your ignoble existence.”

He and Gong Fu were dragon sons, but Father wasn’t very fond of him, saying that he liked slaughter by nature and was a beast without good fortune and morals. In contrast, he couldn’t be more fond of Gong Fu who was born later. It was just a pity that Father had died too soon, otherwise he would definitely drag Father over to see Gong Fu’s current appearance.

With how weak his dragon qi was, could he even be considered a dragon son?

“Yazi?” Gong Fu never thought that he would meet his half brother here and with such an appearance. He reminded the yao from the management bureau with a dark expression, “Yazi is the best at combat among all of Father’s children. In the past when humans strongly believed in supernatural beings, Yazi had another title in the human world – God of War. In the past, many countries’ generals liked to carve his true form on their weapons as a way of imploring for the divine strength of the God of War, so that they would triumph in every battle.”

“What? Very disappointed to see me alive and kicking?’ Yazi crawled out of the crack. He shook the soil off his body and gave a bellow before transforming into a man clad in golden armor. His hand gripped a sharp hatchet, ire written on his soldier-like face. “I was merely taking a nap here and all of you caused the mountain to rock back and forth, how am I supposed to sleep?”

“This formation wasn’t created by you?” Gong Fu’s complexion turned even uglier. This formation required dragon qi in order to be activated, and as the dragon son who had inherited the most of Father’s divine power, Yazi’s dragon qi couldn’t be any stronger. Moreover, his dragon qi was also the purest.

“Why would I place a formation beside me?’ Yazi glanced back at the eye of the formation in the mountain and couldn’t help cursing, “Who came up with this? Are they crazy?”

Rather than say that the yao emperor forcibly awakened by the magic formation was the strongest of all yao, they would be better off calling it an irrational monster that only knew destruction.

Thinking of this, Yazi jumped back into the crack he had just crawled out of before leaping back out a short while later. He turned and made to run, but came face to face with the Baize before he had even taken two steps.

“I was wondering who’s so familiar, turns out it’s the Baize,” Yazi took two steps back, smiling awkwardly. “We haven’t met for thousands of years and you’ve become increasingly vivacious.”

Yazi had the least patience when it came to interacting with divine beasts like the Baize. But the Baize just had to be a divine beast from the same generation as his father, so no matter how poorly mannered he was, he still had to show some restraint in front of the Baize.

“Yazi, who knows you’re resting here?” The Baize blocked Yazi’s road, preventing him from slipping off.

“All my subjects,” Yazi glanced up at the sky that was only left with a trace of light, feeling slightly anxious. When the sky turned completely dark, he wouldn’t be able to run off any longer.

“Who are those subjects?” The Baize continued questioning him.

In a moment of desperation, Yazi didn’t think about why the all-knowing Baize had to ask him about such things. He merely shook his head impatiently. “Just some little yao who want to lead their lives with me, why would this king remember their names?”

The Baize and Gong Fu were both aware that Yazi wasn’t lying; he really was that sort of brainless character. Gong Fu gripped the golden armor on Yazi’s body and sighed. “Elder brother, your dragon qi has been exploited and became one of the catalysts for awakening the yao emperor. The karma is too great, how will you return it in the future if you leave now?”

“Mine?” Yazi looked like he had received a bolt from the blue. Angered into turning back into his original form, he stomped heavily on the ground. “That son of a b*tch dared to scheme against me?!”

He was the source of the dragon qi in the Worship of Ten Thousand Yao formation; wasn’t this just digging a grave for him!

He merely wanted to obtain Father’s inheritance, how had he been implicated in so many things?

The sky turned completely dark, as if Yazi’s enraged roar had broken the last barrier holding back the Worship of Ten Thousand Yao formation.

The heart of the formation was a deep, borderless darkness. Inexhaustible spiritual qi and evil qi poured out of the heart of the formation. One of Fu Li’s feet stepped into the heart of the formation.

“Fu Li!”

Fu Li turned to look at the little dragon running towards him. The tips of his brows furrowed slightly.

Spiritual qi gathered in the hollow of his palm, giving off a dark red glow.

Bright red symbolized passion and vividness, but sometimes dark red symbolized death.

“Zhuang Qing, don’t go over,” The Baize didn’t think that Zhuang Qing would still dare to get close at this juncture. He hurriedly went forward and blocked Zhuang Qing. “He’s not the usual Fu Li now. See how the mark on his forehead is gone? That means he’s already awakened all of the Hou’s power.”

“Including destruction.”

“Then do you know what’s inside the heart of the formation?” Although Zhuang Qing couldn’t know everything under the Heavens like the Baize, he had a premonition that he could not let Fu Li enter the heart of the formation.

Definitely not.

“It’s… the resentment and unreconciled emotions of the deceased yao cultivators.”

“Fu Li is the emperor who will help them take revenge.”

“But Fu Li said he only wants to get into university and become a civil servant,” Zhuang Qing pushed the Baize away and flung the sword in his hand to one side. “I won’t let him step onto the wrong path. Once he does…”

“He will never be able to become a civil servant in the future.”

And then, Zhuang Qing went after Fu Li without looking back.