Chapter 594 The Return Journey

At this stage, whether Mingzhuo has truly betrayed Luoshan remains a matter of accusation and suspicion.

The Great Impermanence doesn't necessarily need evidence to do what it wants; as long as there's sufficient suspicion, it can act without explanation. Mingzhuo already had sufficient motivation to join the Gospel House; in fact, it would be more accurate to say he needed a reason not to join. Although demanding proof of innocence from someone violates basic legal principles and falls under the presumption of guilt, what law can arbitrate disputes between the Great Impermanence? Mingzhuo is currently in a situation where he must prove his innocence.

As long as a basic consensus is reached with the other Great Impermanence, I could bypass the judges' debate and directly kill Mingzhuo without theoretically incurring much criticism. However, Fazheng is clearly an outlier in this regard. He seems to expect to uphold the principles of fairness and justice, believing that without evidence, no matter how strong the suspicion, Mingzhuo cannot be judged as a traitor of Luoshan.

“Zhuang Cheng, as long as you can provide solid evidence, I will not only not object to your handling of Ming Zhuo, but I can even work with you to accomplish this,” Fa Zheng said. “Or, even just relevant clues will do. I also really want to find out whether Ming Zhuo has really been secretly turned by the Gospel Academy. Once I have a direction for the investigation, I will find out the truth myself.”

"Evidence, or clues..."

As I pondered, I glanced at Xiaowan. I realized I'd unknowingly developed a bad habit: whenever I encountered something that required thinking, and Xiaowan was nearby, I couldn't help but want to rely on her.

The little bowl whispered a reminder: "The base."

“Yes, that’s the one.” I looked at Fazheng. “The Luoshan branch base under Mingzhuo was destroyed by the Void Realm Apostle Xugou. Later, its history was cut and pasted into reality, and then destroyed by me in the name of the Third Void Realm Apostle. There should be quite a few ordinary people who survived and were settled by my people. You may have heard about it.”

"Although there are spies there secretly selling information to Taoyuan Township, its original purpose was likely related to the plans between Mingzhuo and Fushinin, especially the research on brain science and genetic science... The branch base itself has now disappeared, but I think it should not be a completely isolated island. There should be a lot of information exchange between it and other branch bases, as well as between it and Mingzhuo. Perhaps it can become a breakthrough in the investigation."

After listening attentively, Fa Zheng nodded, then stood up from the sofa and said, "I understand. I will investigate immediately."

"I'll wait for your good news." I stood up as well.

"Finally, perhaps I'm asking too much, are you really prepared to break ties with Mingzhuo?" Fazheng said. "I can see that you've made considerable progress in the afterlife. Now, even without the aid of the Xuanming Fire, you might be able to suppress Mingzhuo. But how is that any different from last time? You still can't kill Mingzhuo."

"An unkillable mortal enemy is terrifying, meaning you must be prepared to face his wrath and retaliation at any time; or do you intend to wage a protracted war of attrition against Mingzhuo, like last time, hoping to drag it out until his lifespan runs out?"

Upon hearing this, I responded with a gesture, raising my palm and unleashing an invisible, mysterious fluctuation—the power of the fragments of the divine seal.

"—The power of the True Spirit!" Fa Zheng exclaimed in surprise. "No, this is... the power of a fragment of the Divine Seal?"

Although not as in-depth as Shenzhao, Fazheng must have seriously studied the power of the Divine Seal Fragments and knew that the essence of the power of the Divine Seal Fragments was the power of the True Spirit.

He murmured, "So that's how it is... Being able to directly use the power of the divine seal fragments, is this also a characteristic of the Void Realm Apostles?"

Currently, there are only two known ways to directly mobilize the power of the Divine Seal fragments with one's own will: one is to become a Void Realm Apostle, and the other is to implant the Divine Seal fragments into one's own body and soul, like Ying Lingyun and Dr. Silver Mask.

Others who want to mobilize the power of the Divine Seal Fragments can only rely on external conditions such as formations or items.

“Such pure spiritual power is truly rare,” Fa Zheng said. “Historically, there have been those who walked the path of self-proving their true spirit and conditionally summoned spiritual power, and there have been techniques for forcibly producing extremely small amounts of spiritual power using incredibly difficult methods. However, most of these methods either lacked sufficient purity or were too small to be practically applicable. You, on the other hand, do not have those problems. Although the amount is not large, if concentrated, it is enough to achieve the effect of a true death.”

"As long as death is summoned by the power of true spirit, even the immortal body of Naraku, whose life is tainted, cannot resist it... They have indeed done a lot of work."

He uttered a sigh of emotion.

"Can you tell me how Meizuo attacked Asahi and the others?" I asked.

“You’d know more about these things than you would from the people around you. It’s time for you to reunite with them,” Fa Zheng said. “Well then, I won’t bother you any longer. See you next time.”

-

After Fazheng left, Xiaowan and I also left that place and came to the street of Luoshan headquarters.

"Next, we'll go meet Ma Zao and Zhu Shi," I said. "Are you ready?"

“I’m ready, Brother Zhuang Cheng,” Xiao Wan said seriously.

Carrying the small bowl, I moved towards my residence at the Luoshan headquarters.

At the same time, I am also manipulating the "fireflies" to search for the location of the murky life.

Although I have the determination and the means to kill Mingzhuo, I know very well that things won't go so smoothly. Just now, while I was talking to Fazheng, I also tried to secretly search for Mingzhuo's location using the "fireflies," but I found nothing.

There is an obvious fact: Mingzhuo must already know of my return.

When I was at the Great Completion stage, the magical power I unleashed not only covered my own city, but also could be sensed by demon hunters in all the surrounding cities. After becoming the Great Impermanence, the scale became vastly different. During the conflict with Xuanming, I didn't have time to make any attempt to conceal myself, and Xuanming himself attacked openly, generating enough magical power fluctuations that could be felt by all the demon hunters in the country.

That's why Fazheng came to us so quickly.

So what about Mingzhuo? After breaking his vow, he sensed my return, especially since my magical energy fluctuations were actually clashing with Xuanming's... What will he do next?

First, he will definitely try his best to hide it, just like he is now.

No matter what, he is the successor of Huang Quan, so it's best not to think that killing him is easier than killing Huang Quan. I know all too well how resilient and adaptable his cruel and arrogant nature truly is.

He was publicly humiliated by me, a newly promoted Great Impermanence, yet he could swallow his anger, make an unequal oath of defeat to the other Great Impermanence, and frankly admit his defeat to his followers... He is not the kind of insignificant person who would risk his life for the sake of face and dignity, but a ruthless character like Huang Quan who can endure hardship and bide his time.

In this game of "hide-and-seek," I don't intend to go it alone. To bring him out of the shadows, it will be necessary to rely on Fazheng's methods, and we can also try to enlist the help of the fortune teller. Perhaps because of Xiaowan's existence, I'm increasingly aware of the importance of "the power of others."

In addition, there is something else I need to mention, though I'm not sure if it's important.

It's about something related to "fireflies".

I have many "fireflies" scattered throughout the real world. Apart from the "surveillance fireflies" used to protect those important to me, there are also many "fireflies" that I just set up somewhere. The purpose of doing this is to leave a mark so that it will be convenient for me to travel to different places in the future.

Many "fireflies" don't even serve this purpose; they're just the type I used to launch but was too lazy to retrieve or cancel. Without a shared perspective, all those "fireflies" combined don't consume much of my mental processing power; they're like random locators scattered around.

When I returned to the real world, I confirmed that the total number of "fireflies" had not decreased, but I didn't check the others carefully except for the "monitoring fireflies". Now, in order to pinpoint the location of the Life Impurity, I've checked the "fireflies" in many locations to see if I can use them as a medium to capture any residual fluctuations from the Life Impurity's recent activities.

Then I discovered a "firefly" in an abnormal state.

This "firefly" inexplicably appeared in a location I hadn't set up before, and the signal it transmitted was extremely weak, as if it were trapped in some other dimension. I could vaguely determine its direction, but the distance was equally ambiguous, and I could only define a "rough area" for its coordinates.

I have a feeling that I occasionally encounter situations where a "firefly" enters some random place. Fortunately, no matter how enclosed an alternate dimension is, it pales in comparison to the void of the fifteenth-floor basement. As long as I go to that "general area" to take a look and search, I can confirm what state that "firefly" is in.

Right now, I want to focus on the things that have the highest priority.

I arrived at the gate of my family's mansion with the small bowl in my arms, where three familiar figures had already gathered.

(End of this chapter)