Star Odyssey

Behind Lu Yin, a Void Wanderer suddenly appeared. It was about to tear through the void, but before it could do so, Lu Yin grabbed it and crushed it to death. He had already managed to kill quite a few Void Wanderers.

His performance had started to attract the attention of many of the stronger astral beasts, and occasionally, a Cruiser beast would appear and ambush him. However, not a single one of them were able to break through his universal armor. Lu Yin actually freely allowed such astral beasts to attack him, as he only needed one attack to eliminate them.

Lu Yin’s performance finally attracted the attention of even more powerful beings.

A Hunter astral beast tore through the void and opened its mouth at Lu Yin. A powerful strength gathered around it before the beast eventually spat out a compressed energy ball at Lu Yin while also suppressing him with its pressure.

Lu Yin looked up, but he had no plans of dodging since not even this sort of attack was enough to breach his defenses. He even had the time to glance into the distance to look at a place where there were too many rune lines to properly observe. There was a battle between Enlighters taking place there.

He did not plan to dodge since he was confident in being able to withstand the attack, though everyone else thought that he had been targeted and was unable to avoid it. Many who saw the scene felt pity for Lu Yin, as another cultivator was about to die. But they had seen such a thing too many times, as it constantly took place on this battlefield. One thing that stood out was that Lu Yin was the first Limiteer who had managed to attract a Hunter realm astral beast’s direct attack due to his strength. It was pitiful. 

Right before the compressed energy ball collided against Lu Yin, the void distorted as a sword suddenly appeared. It sliced upwards and split the energy attack apart, causing it to explode on either side of Lu Yin as it fell apart into the ground.

Lu Yin looked up in shock to see a youth standing above him. This person was a Hunter, and his rune lines were not lacking as they even surpassed what Lu Yin saw from the Hunter realm astral beast that had just attacked him.

The young Hunter leaped up and dashed into the void, moving out to battle against the Hunter realm beast. 

It didn’t take long for blood to scatter through space and down onto the ground below, staining everything. After that, the youthful Hunter landed and looked over at Lu Yin.

Lu Yin also looked at the youth. “Thank you.”

“You’re pretty good, but you’re too timid. As long as you don’t go into outer space, there’s no need to wear universal armor. It’ll only restrict the power that you can put out,” the youth commented before vanishing. 

“Seventh Bro, you’re being looked down on, haha!” The Ghost Monkey laughed happily.

Lu Yin grinned. Looked down on? No—he was being valued, as not every Limiteer qualified to be rescued by a Hunter. The battlefield was massive, and Limiteers died all the time, as would Explorers, Cruisers, and even Hunters. Too many powerhouses perished in this place, and he had been rescued by a Hunter purely because of his outstanding performance. 

The battle continued on for another day, and the greatest change during this time was in the Enlighters’ battle, which drew even closer to the stronghold. Liu Qiuyu could not drag the Enlighters’ battlefield somewhere far from the fortress as his strength was similar to the Enlighter astral beast, and neither one was able to gain the upper hand even though the battle had lasted for so long. 

As the Enlighters’ battlefield drew ever closer, a corner of Seasons Fort collapsed, and many beasts and humans perished in the chaos. 

The youth who had rescued Lu Yin also encountered a strong enemy at this time, a miniscule astral beast only about a meter long. This creature moved about extremely nimbly, but it also had a very powerful body. It seemed rather familiar. 

“It’s a Yin Guai, one of the twin Guais of our Astral Beast Domain. They’re ranked fifth on the Celestial Beast List. They’re a very powerful tribe,” the monkey said. 

Lu Yin suddenly remembered the beast as he had faced its species at Erudite Flowzone’s border warfront. The Yin Guais and Sheng Guais had joined forces to protect the Sheng Aos, and Lu Yin had even been suppressed by a Yin Guai at the same realm as him. It was no wonder why this Hunter realm Yin Guai was able to go neck to neck with the Hunter youth. 

It should not have been this close of a battle, but when the Yin Guai started hiding its body, the swordsman youth started to fall behind. More of the beast’s attacks started landing while he started having difficulty resisting.

“Monkey, what weaknesses do the Yin Guais have?” Lu Yin asked.

The monkey fell silent.

“You’re my tamed beast, so you don’t have any relationships with the Astral Beast Domain any longer,” Lu Yin spoke in a cold, quiet tone, as he did not wish for the Ghost Monkey to keep anything hidden from him.

The monkey was helpless. “The Yin Guais’ strength and defense are absurd, and it has a similar reputation to you humans’ Mavis Family. They’re very difficult to deal with, but they’re weak to spiritual force attacks. Since ancient times, whenever you humans fought against my astral beasts, the Daynight Clan would always fight against the Yin Guais. That person's clearly not a Daynight Clan member, so if he wants to win.. Pfft.”

There was another bang as the Yin Guai used its claw to smash the Hunter youth into the ground. The creature suddenly appeared from the void, looking extremely proud.

After a while, that youth emerged from the ground, panting. There were even scars on his sword. 

Lu Yin suddenly thought of something, after which he retrieved a spear from his cosmic ring and tossed it to the youth. “Use this to fight.” 

The youth doubtfully took it, but his eyes gleamed the moment he came in contact with the spear. He charged ferociously towards Yin Guai and stabbed out with the spear.

This spear was the one that Lu Yin had obtained from inside the ancient centipede's body. He had kept two; one was saved for himself while the other had been meant for Zhuo Daynight. However, he had forgotten about it. Now, he had given that spear to the youth Hunter.

The spear possessed a spiritual force attack that could instantly wipe out an Explorer. Once it was used, it was not weak. However, the spear’s material was not too great since it was an item from ancient times.

The Yin Guai vanished once again. The youth swept out with the spear, and a formless ripple expanded outwards. The Yin Guai wailed in pain and had its concealed state forcefully dispelled. It stared at that spear in apprehension. 

The youth sneered. He might not know how to use a spear effectively, but he was at least able to wield it like a sword as he swung it about. The Yin Guai’s physical body was tough, but its defenses against spiritual force were pathetic. The two’s strength were on similar levels, but the youth had suddenly received a spear that was able to target the Yin Guai’s weak spiritual force with each attack. It didn’t take long before the beast wasn’t able to take the assault any more and fled. 

The youth’s eyes turned cold, and an indescribable vigor gathered around him. Lu Yin watched on as the Hunter’s rune lines actually formed into a sword. Then, he used the spear as a sword and stabbed out with it.

The Yin Guai shrieked and whirled around to face the attack as the spear collided against the beast. The spear shattered into fragments that floated around in outer space. The Yin Guai froze in place, clearly seriously injured from the spiritual force attack. The youth followed up with a slice from his sword and beheaded the astral beast, killing it completely. 

The youth then relaxed. He moved to grab the fragments of the spear, and he muttered to himself before landing in front of Lu Yin. He spread his hands in a helpless manner. “My apologies. Your weapon is ruined.”

Lu Yin shrugged. “Take it as repayment for your kindness in saving me earlier.”

The youth seriously replied, “On the battlefield, I will save whoever I can whenever possible. Those are the rules of the battlefield. It’s not about kindness or anything of that sort. I was able to kill the enemy because of the weapon you gave me, but now, that weapon has been destroyed, and I’m responsible for it. How about this—the contribution points from killing that Yin Guai will be split evenly between the two of us.” 

Lu Yin was stunned. “Split evenly?”

The man nodded solemnly. “Half and half. There’s no need to decline.”

Lu Yin did not plan to reject the offer, as that Yin Guai had at the very least been on the level of an elite Hunter, and it might even be evaluated to be a beast at the monstrous genius level, which meant that it was worth at least 1,000 Ironblood Points. Even if he was given half, it would be 500 points, which was equivalent to 500 star essences. Lu Yin felt no need to decline since he was actually losing out if he calculated things. That spear would have been worth far more than 500 star essences if he had sold it to someone who understood its history.

However, this was a battlefield, and such things could not be evaluated here. The value of battle contributions could not be compared to money. 

“I’m Liu Zhan. Here’s my contact info,” the youth said.

Lu Yin’s brows rose. “Liu Zhan? The same Liu Zhan who’s on the Ironblood Rankings?”

Liu Zhan nodded, and the two quickly exchanged contact details before the Hunter charged back into space once again.

There was no time for idle chit-chat on the battlefield.

Lu Yin had not expected to meet Liu Zhan during his first battle, but he had a favorable impression of this person. The young Hunter did not have the same demeanor as many of the Innerverse’s great powers’ heirs. He was more like a soldier, which reminded Lu Yin of Zhang Dingtian. 

The battle continued on for another half day until the astral beasts finally retreated like a flood drawing back, leaving behind a miserable Seasons Fort. 

During this battle, Lu Yin had personally witnessed countless deaths, and the corpses piled up into hills. He had seen a continent collapse, witnessed planets explode, and experienced an unprecedented terror that he had felt even at the border warfront in the past. 

By the end of the battle, quite a few of the cultivators who had come from the eastern weaves to answer the call for reinforcements had died or been severely injured. Many people who had just entered Ironblood Weave had already died, as not every cultivator had abilities like Lu Yin, Aden, or Huo Qingshan. 

The Cruisers, Explorers, and war fleet that had been sent by the Great Yu Empire would still take a while to arrive. As he saw the miserable results of the battle, Lu Yin had a bad feeling that the reinforcements from the Outerverse would not enjoy a good ending. This place truly was a blackhole of death.

The massive-scale battle had ended, and what came next was tidying up the stronghold. It could not take too long since there was no telling when the next battle would break out. At the very least, that wouldn’t happen for at least three days. 

Lu Yin and the others gathered together to report to one of the Hunters based in the stronghold and registered themselves in Seasons Fort. As for the deceased, they were similarly recorded, since consolation payments would be made to one’s families whenever someone died in Ironblood Weave. The still-alive family members would become the family of a martyr, and such an identity could possibly help them in the future. 

There was no stringent selection process, and the military discipline that Lu Yin had expected from a battlefield did not exist in this place. According to a veteran that he spoke to, the front four strongholds did not have any military supervision because there was no time to formally train soldiers. All of the soldiers sent to the front four strongholds were originally from the lower five. As for the front four fortresses, reinforcements might be sent there at any time, but there was only ever one objective given to them: survive. 

Huo Qingshan and Aden were forcibly sent to the main pass of the stronghold, which was where the high command of Seasons Fort was located. Commander Liu Qiuyu and many other experts gathered there to await deployments. Although they were Hunters, neither Huo Qingshan nor Aden were average cultivators. In particular, Aden had performed absolutely brilliantly, so it was normal for him to be sent to the central base of the fortress. 

However, Lu Yin was unwilling for this to happen, as Aden and Huo Qingshan had come to Ironblood Weave to support him. If they left, then he would have no one protecting him. It had to be acknowledged that his performance during the most recent battle had attracted the attention of many Hunter realm astral beasts that had attempted to kill him. 

Unfortunately, Lu Yin was just a Limiteer, and even if he was the strongest Limiteer in the universe, he still didn’t have the right to voice his wants or opinions in this place. The various statuses that he had gained while roaming the universe meant nothing in Ironblood Weave. In this place, the only thing of his that had any meaning at all were his Honor Points, but since he only had two, he was given no privileges in the stronghold. 

In the end, Aden and Huo Qingshan were both ordered away to different locations.

Lu Yin stared blankly into space, as he would need to keep a lower profile in future battles. Although there was no worry of his life being in danger since he had his upgraded universal armor, it was never a good thing to be targeted.

Eh? What’s that?

Lu Yin looked up to see strange objects floating above the stronghold that were about the same size as a large meteoroid. After the battle ended, these objects could be seen floating above the fortress, and while each one was rather small in size, they were sprinkled about the sky rather densely.