Chapter 9

Chapter 9

“I won’t go.”

“Ling Yun!”

I roared at him through my divine sense-

“Jiao existed in the Great Marsh long before humans ever walked this earth! We were already performing the Zoujiao back then!

“What do you mean, ‘destroying fertile fields and harming the common people’? When they moved next to my home, did they not know there were Jiao in this marsh?!

“What ‘slaughterous karma’? Was it not they who first slaughtered my kin to the point of extinction?!

“If you humans are the darlings of the Heavenly Dao, then that only proves the Heavenly Dao is my enemy as well!

“I am not wrong, and I will not repent! You want me to submit to the Heavenly Dao, but I cannot submit to my enemy!

“Instead, I shall ascend to the heavens and demand justice from the Heavenly Dao itself!”

I was impassioned, my chest burning with righteous indignation.

I expected him to refute me harshly.

To use those sanctimonious old narratives of his.

However, he remained silent for a long, long time, until finally, he let out a single sigh.

“Very well.”

He watched me quietly through our divine sense for a moment, a faint flush gradually rising to his face.

Then, he gave me a bashful little shove. “Go on, then.”

What on earth?

That scoundrel is trying to disturb my Dao Heart again!

But in that moment, I felt the weight on my body lift.

Chang Yuan had released his shackles on me.

After a moment of stunned silence, I was overcome with wild joy.

I soared upward, charging straight into the massive thunderstorm.

I watched as the dark clouds overhead formed a gargantuan vortex.

Then, a dense barrage of Lightning Tribulation fell.

Bolts scattered across the entire sky like stars on a chessboard.

My scales were completely destroyed by the very first strike, leaving nothing but raw flesh.

It was a temperature capable of incinerating a jiao dragon’s soul; my blood was already boiling like hot oil.

Yet, I wasn’t afraid at all.

My physical body and my Jiao Soul should be destroyed in the Heavenly Tribulation with grand splendor, just like my ancestors.

I would not become someone else’s vessel!

But as that strongest, World-Ending Lightning Tribulation fell-in that split second between life and death-the lightning before my eyes suddenly vanished, and the world fell silent.

I let out a long sigh.

The world had suddenly become quiet.

I felt my bones and my flesh peeling away.

And yet, I didn’t feel a single spark of pain.

Scenes from my entire life began to flash before my eyes.

Ancestors of the Great Marsh Jiao Clan walked toward me from the Primordial Chaos.

Generation after generation, they fought against heaven, against earth, and against man.

An endless, vital cycle.

Since the day I was born, the waters of the Great Marsh had been meager and turbid, smelling faintly of rot.

But in the Great Marsh of Ancient Times, one couldn’t even tell where the water ended and the sky began.

The waters of the Great Marsh back then were wild, but not violent.

When the wind blew, the reed leaves would brush against each other with a soft rustle.

Unknown divine birds of Ancient Times would constantly pass by, striking the waves in play.

When mortals hear the cries of the Jiao Clan, they always feel terror; even we find our own voices piercing.

But now, the roars of the ancient Jiao Clan echoed in my ears.

Mingled with the sound of the wind, the water, and the birds, it sounded so joyful.

From far away, I heard my mother’s comforting voice.

“My child, you have wandered your whole life and suffered so much…”

I slowly closed my eyes.

“My child, come home.”

Contented, I prepared to fall into the Great Marsh beneath me.

The Great Marsh of my dreams.