Chapter 256. On the Verge of Death? A Radiant Starry Sky, the Great Age Arrives at Last

At first, the news circulated only within a small circle of people.

It was just too shocking, and no one really believed that it was real. On the surface, it sounded reasonable that Lu Yuan was severely injured in the fight against those Immortals in outer space.

However, those who heard it refused to accept it.

For example, the Awakened. They had just received word that King Lu had successfully stopped those Immortals. How could he get injured? In their minds, they believed that those beings from the Outer Cosmos were cursing Lu Yuan out of spite.

For the time being, no one paid it much attention.

A month later, however, the rumors only intensified instead of dying down. The Awakened couldn’t help but feel uneasy, but they still insisted that it was just a bunch of nonsense. They insisted that there was no way it could be true.

However, those who painstakingly traveled to Mount Tai couldn’t see Lu Yuan. The official explanation was that he was in seclusion, but Lu Yuan’s absence planted more seeds of doubt in everyone.

As for the beings from the Outer Cosmos, they, too, had been skeptical at first, but it all changed when the Three-Headed Ghosts and the Primeval Daemons received messages from their Lesser Sage elders in outer space.

They confirmed it. They had seen Lu Yuan being injured on the moon with their own eyes. They simply had not paid it much attention at the time. In hindsight, however, his injuries had to be severe. After all, his enemies were Immortals.

The revelation ignited the community of invaders from the Outer Cosmos. They were all thrilled. It truly was a rollercoaster of emotions. One moment, they were in heaven, but the next moment, they were in hell. They had all decided to stay put until the inevitable full-on descent of their people, but Lu Yuan was injured and in dire straits. Apparently, he was on the verge of death.

For the living beings of Earth, this was terrible news. For the beings from the Outer Cosmos, nothing could have been more welcome.

Under these circumstances, they gradually let their guard down, and quite a few of them even decided that they no longer had to stay hidden. They sent a small number of their people to deliberately stir up trouble and gauge the officials’ response.

If the reaction was fierce, then it meant Lu Yuan’s condition leaned more toward the side of great. If their response was muted, however, then things would soon become very

interesting.

Of course, they dared not go too far, considering Lu Yuan’s terrifying reputation. Their actions were small-scale and limited to things like entering the five supercities to test the waters.

Shockingly, the officials showed almost no reaction beyond issuing warnings. They took no further action aside from that. It was markedly different from before, and it convinced them even further that the rumors were most likely true.

At the same time, the news finally reached the ears of ordinary citizens and the Awakened.

Things became chaotic once again, and it was escalating rapidly. Heated discussions erupted all over the place, and they all discussed one thing—had Lu Yuan truly been gravely injured while stopping the Immortals?

Unfortunately, no one could verify it, as there was simply no way to reach him.

Of course, the officials were fully aware of what was going on, as the rumor had come from them. The reason they had not said anything was that Elder Ji and the others were controlling the narrative, blurring the line between truth and fiction.

If one wanted people to believe in something, one ought to avoid announcing it outright, as it would only raise suspicion. The key was to plant a seed of doubt in their minds first, and then one could steadily nourish it.

By the time the rumors were denied, only a few would believe the denial.

Elder Ji and the other leaders wanted everyone to feel doubtful.

Time flew by just like that, and another month slipped by.

Besides the discussions about Lu Yuan’s apparent injuries, the world itself was changing. The re-manifestation of the Separation of Heaven and Earth accelerated the Global Awakening.

In the outer space just above Earth, more and more figures arrived in large numbers before descending on Earth. For now, none of them was stronger than Sages, but at this rate, it was only a matter of time.

Among the descending beings from the Outer Cosmos, none were overwhelmingly powerful in terms of raw strength, but their status was significantly different.

The earlier arrivals had been advance parties, but the new arrivals were the real players. They were beings with exceptional talent, and most of them qualified as Rankers of their respective races or clans. Upon descending, they immediately gathered their people.

At the same time, the officials closely monitoring the outer space discovered that the number of beings out there had grown dramatically. The clans and races present numbered in the hundreds, and the total count was difficult to estimate.

Fortunately, they were all spread out across the solar system. After all, a terrifying sight would have been created had they been densely packed in one place.

The disruption of the plan involving the full-on descent of those from the Outer Cosmos and the severe injuries sustained by those Immortals elicited the fury of the top one hundred starfields’ old monsters. In response, they decided to accelerate their other plans.

A myriad of living beings pervaded the starry skies just above Earth. Despite belonging to many different clans and races, they all unanimously decided to send their people down on Earth with one goal in mind…

“Kill that human, Lu Yuan! Stop his rise!”

“For now, such a powerful being must not exist in the Milky Way Starfield. We’ve got to nip this threat in the bud.”

“The Milky Way Starfield and the Celestial Court are relics of the past. This world will become our holy grounds for evolution. As for the natives of this world, they are mere ants.”

Voice after voice echoed throughout the starry skies above Earth. Led by the Celestials, even Great Sages appeared, and boundless energy erupted from them.

The pressure coming from a Great Sage exuded was enough to make even celestial bodies, as they were just a single step away from becoming Immortals.

The Three-Headed Ghost Race, the Yin Sparrow Race, the Primeval Daemon Race, and the others were there as well. They had also learned of Lu Yuan’s injuries, and they were making plans to send people down to kill him.

The officials saw all that, and they became somber at the sight. Lu Yuan’s plan was working. The great clans and races from the Outer Cosmos could no longer hold back.

They were prepared, but they remained worried because the Separation of Heaven and Earth was weakening by the day.

Every day, large numbers of beings from the Outer Cosmos would descend on Earth. At this rate, Sages would arrive sooner or later.

Even though there was still no direct threat to the populace or the world, the peace was what made it so unsettling. It was the calm before the storm, and no one knew what the situation would look like when everything finally erupted.

The scene also told the officials one crucial thing—the Great Age had come at last. In the future, they would no longer be able to control everything. Now, the only option was to keep on strengthening the Celestial Court.

Elder Ji and the others knew that the world would only become more unstable as more invaders reached Earth. They also noticed that they were probing for more information; they wanted to confirm Lu Yuan’s condition once and for all.

They knew the plan was on the verge of succeeding. All that remained was to wait for them to become fully convinced. However, Lu Yuan’s absence was starting to make quite a few figures anxious.

The Spirit Monkey, the Golden-Winged Great Peng, and the Peacock King were growing restless as well, as his seclusion had lasted far longer than any before it.

In the end, Jiang Ningxian stepped forward to explain. The time it would take to reach the Sage Realm depended on the depths of one’s foundations and talent. Someone with deeper foundations and exceptional talent would find it difficult to reach it, but the profits to reap would, of course, be absolutely massive.

To be honest, even Jiang Ningxian found it somewhat strange. Lu Yuan’s breakthrough was taking an unusually long time.

When she was in the Unfettered Realm, she shattered forty-three genetic shackles, but even her breakthrough had not taken this long. Despite that, the elders of her clan had called her the best genius the Jiang Clan had produced in ten thousand years.

Could it be that Lu Yuan had shattered more genetic shackles than she had?

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep