In one of the many lower-ranked realms, a man garbed in black robes with two horns growing out of his forehead smiled. He was Donghai Longzi, who had fled the scene with Demon Empress Bluefeather.

“What’s wrong? Did something happen?” Demon Empress Bluefeather asked. The realm the two stayed in was nothing more than a desolate, unranked realm. It didn’t have an outpost or anything like that. She stopped here in order to test if someone had followed them.

“It can be considered a good thing,” Donghai Longzi said. “I made a slight breakthrough in my comprehension.”

Demon Empress Bluefeather blinked. After processing what he said, she sighed. Donghai Longzi was already at the peak of the Demon King Realm. If he made a breakthrough in his comprehension, wouldn’t it mean that he was extremely close to the Demon Emperor Realm?

Donghai Longzi’s comprehension might not be as good as her since she was a veteran demon empress, but she would not think he would be much weaker than her. Demonic cultivation had emphasis on the power of the body, more so than martial cultivators. With Donghai Longzi’s tyrannical fleshly body, he would be capable of equaling her.

“It seems that the Dragon Clan will add another demon emperor to their ranks. How envious,” Demon Empress Bluefeather said. In the entire Divine Beast Pseudo System, the Dragon Clan made up fifty percent of all the experts, double the amount of experts in the Qilin and Phoenix Clan individually.

“It’s just a slight breakthrough,” Donghai Longzi said. “I only have a slightly bigger chance. This last step is like an infinite gulf with no end in sight. I only happened to see the other side when fighting the Dragon Emperor. Unfortunately, I lost sight of it soon after. Who knows how long it will take me to regain that feeling?”

Demon Empress Bluefeather chuckled. “No worries. You are still young. Speaking of which, you don’t have a mate yet, do you? I happen to know a few juniors that are outstanding in quality and appearance. Many dragon lords have pursued them, but they agreed to none of them. But I think they will agree if you court them.”

The corner of Donghai Longzi’s lips twitched. Although he was a dragon by species, he still had the aesthetics of a human. Even after gaining the ability to transform into a humanoid, many demons still preferred their origin form and many more have not even taken on a human form before. It was only those demons who needed to conceal themselves among humans that would deliberately take on a different form.

“I still think it’s too soon,” Donghai Longzi said, turning his gaze away. “I want to focus wholeheartedly on getting stronger first.”

“Well, I’ll respect your wishes.” Although she said that, Demon Empress Bluefeather had already decided to send some of the promising and beautiful juniors to Donghai Longzi. She didn’t believe that with a dragon’s innate lustful nature, he wouldn’t be moved.

Donghai Longzi didn’t know this, nor would he care if he knew the truth. It was true that he became more lustful after becoming a true dragon, but that was only comparatively. His true nature was that of a cultivation freak. His greatest wish was to surpass his main body in strength and realm.

And it just so happened that his main body got something incredibly helpful to him. From Demon Emperor Redraco’s mouth, he knew that his current bloodline was already at the peak among true dragons, but what if he absorbed the divine dragon scale and used it to transform his body?

Tianyi had no use for the divine dragon scale. He might study the divine law on the scale, but that’s it. In the end, the scale will still fall into his possession. While waiting, a glimmer of light appeared in Donghai Longzi’s eyes, full of anticipation for the future.

The two of them stayed in the unranked realm for a few months. Only after making sure no one followed did the two of them leave. However, they didn’t immediately arrive at the outpost, but moved to another unrelated lower-rank realm. The two repeated this action ten or more times to guarantee safety.

Ten years later, the Demon Clan began their operation.

By chance, news that Jiaohu, a promising junior of the Dragon Clan, appearing in the Three Thousand Immortal Realms Systems reached the ears of the Immortal Court and Numinous Sword Sect.

---

A white-robed immortal monarch and tens of true immortals appeared in the Vast Void above the middle-rank realm where Jiaohu had been reported to be last seen. The immortal was Ba Shifang.

According to the report, Jiaohu was only in the True Demon Realm, but to guarantee his death, the Immortal Court dispatched him and ten true immortals. The true immortals weren’t the main combatants, but Ba Shifang. The true immortals were there to sniff out Jiaohu and specialized in investigation.

To make the act appear more convincing, the Immortal Court didn’t inform Ba Shifang or the ten true immortals about the Demon Clan’s true plans.

Ba Shifang had an unhappy expression. He hadn’t volunteered, but the Immortal Court decided it would be safer if he went due to his connection with Tianyi. That wasn't the root cause of his unhappiness. No, it was the fact that he had to delay his wedding to Hu Landie.

Hu Landie hadn’t chosen to accompany him and stayed behind to refine the monarch artifact gifted by Meng Tingfeng.

“Go and find traces of that Jiaohu,” Ba Shifang said. Under his command, the ten true immortals obeyed and entered the middle-rank realm while he waited outside.

Ba Shifang moved into a lotus position, but he didn’t start cultivating. No, he took out a Xiyi Talisman and messaged Hu Landie. When she didn’t reply, he started browsing the forums.

[Top Ten Genius of the Modern Era]

Ba Shifang rolled his eyes. After knowing Tianyi, he couldn’t see anyone else as a genius anymore. Still, he opened the forum and read through it. He even watched videos of the so-called geniuses.

Not all the recordings were done by bystanders. Some of the geniuses even recorded themselves and uploaded it onto the Xiyinet. Some of the geniuses who did this wanted to gain fame. As hot-blooded youngsters, they naturally wanted to become famous and compare themselves to their peers.

Even the disciples of the Immortal Court did this. The only difference was that their information could only be accessed by fellow members of the Immortal Court. Because of this, they had their own rankings, separate from the public. As members of the Immortal Court, they each had their sense of superiority and disdained competing with the common cultivators.

After the Buzhou Immortal Sect became the Immortal Court, they no longer held a disciple acceptance ceremony every decade. Instead, they focused more on quality. Every once in a while, idle immortals would venture the land. If they saw a talented youngster, they would accept them as a disciple. As such, all modern disciples of the Immortal Court were disciples of immortals.

Because of this, rumors of immortals accepting disciples appeared all over the Trinity Continent and even the outer islands of the endless sea. The Xiyi Talisman only increased the effect of the rumor.

As a result, more geniuses recorded themselves and uploaded onto the Xiyinet, hoping to catch an immortal’s attention. Most of these geniuses had inferior backgrounds and wanted to catch the attention of an expert to change their fate. Some, who had good backgrounds but their circumstances weren’t good, also did this.

Of course, if they were stupid and exposed themselves to their enemy, which resulted in their death, they could only blame themselves. No amount of talent could cure stupidity.

Ba Shifang clicked out of the forum post and continued to scroll. Then, his eyes caught sight of another ranking.

[Top Ten Beauties of the Primordial Realm]

He felt his interest be tickled, and he clicked on it. “Huh?”

Grand Elder Zhang and Sovereign Xi appearing there didn’t surprise him much. Daoyi appearing didn’t surprise him much since she often posted music videos of herself. But the addition of Hu Landie surprised him. Not only that, she was ranked ninth. Furthermore, there were pictures of each of them.

Generally, many immortals used some techniques to conceal their appearance, especially women. But the forum post had their pictures. It might not be the original pictures and even recreated, but the accuracy meant that the poster had to have seen them before.

‘Just which true immortal or monarch is so bored to make this post?’ Ba Shifang thought. Only a member of the Immortal Court could have written this. ‘It wouldn’t be Tianyi, right?’

He looked at the poster and saw an unfamiliar username. However, that didn’t mean anything. With Tianyi’s control of the Xiyinet, it was a piece of cake for him to create a false identity.

As Ba Shifang went through the lists of possible people who could have written this, he noticed a large movement. Looking toward the source, he saw a group of immortals flying toward him. He instantly recognized them as members of the Numinous Sword Sect, especially their leader, Meng Tingfeng.

Ba Shifang stored the Xiyi Talisman and greeted them. “Daoist Meng.”

“Shifang,” Meng Tingfeng said. Once again igniting Ba Shifang’s annoyance. “I didn’t expect the Immortal Court to send you. Have you gained anything yet?”

“I just got here not long ago. I already sent people to investigate, but I haven’t gotten the results yet,” Ba Shifang said.

Meng Tingfeng nodded. He turned toward the true immortals he led and ordered them to also investigate. Then he focused his attention on Ba Shifang once more. “Is this part of the Immortal Court’s plan? Is there anything I need to do in order to act according to the plan?”

“Yes,” Ba Shifang replied, also using his immortal sense. “You just have to pretend there is nothing wrong and play along with the Demon Clan’s arrangements. If anything dangerous happens, help will arrive.”

“With you and my strength, we can even fight an immortal emperor. I doubt it will reach that point,” Meng Tingfeng said.

“We haven’t met since last time. How is it, have you made any improvement?” Meng Tingfeng asked. Their earlier conversation had only taken a few seconds, so outsiders shouldn’t have known what they discussed.

“How can that be? Only a short amount of time has passed,” Ba Shifang said.

“Is that right? Then you better be careful. I made quite a bit of improvement,” Meng Tingfeng said. His words contained a hint of pride and even boasting.

‘I didn’t know that you were this type of person,’ Ba Shifang thought. In his view, Meng Tingfeng should be one of those low-key kind of guys, a dog with no bark but a hefty bite. How could he know that Meng Tingfeng was acting like a bragging father?

The two continued to discuss. Ba Shifang wanted to go back to browsing the Xiyinet, but Meng Tingfeng seemed to have endless amounts of topics he wanted to talk about.

“Have you been eating well?”

“How is your treatment in the Immortal Court?”

“Are your peers respecting you?”

“Have you married yet?”

“How do you feel about Shu Qingya? I forgot you don’t know her name. You should know her as Sword Monarch Shu, the lord of Clear Elegance Sword Peak.”

Thankfully for Ba Shifang’s sanity, the true immortals returned. They successfully captured Jiaohu’s trail. And thus, silence appeared as the two groups chased after the promising junior of the Dragon Clan. They discovered him in an unranked realm. Jiaohu was a toad-like dragon with flowing whiskers ten times his own body length. Currently, he had his eyes closed and seemed to be comprehending the worldly laws.

“Do you want to take action, or should I do it?” Meng Tingfeng asked.

“How are your capturing skills?”

Meng Tingfeng shook his head. “Average.”

“Then I’ll do it.” Without wasting another moment, Ba Shifang reached out. A large hand formed of the five elements formed and reached toward the toad dragon. Before Jiaohu could even react, he was already captured in Ba Shifang’s palm.

“Okay, let’s—” Ba Shifang was about to say interrogate, but he stopped as he sensed a familiar presence.

Meng Tingfeng also looked over because there was a large commotion.

A patch of space the Vast Void ripped, and a majestic aura rolled out. And then, a man garbed in black robes with two horns growing out of his head appeared. Although he had a humanoid shape, his aura was that of a true dragon. He was Donghai Longzi.

Ba Shifang stayed silent. He hadn’t seen Donghai Longzi for over a thousand years, and he never expected their reunion would be like this.

Unlike Ba Shifang’s shock, Meng Tingfeng grabbed the sword slung over his shoulder. He could feel the danger emanating from Donghai Longzi’s body. “Who are you?”