Tribulation of Myriad Races

Although Su Yu had not managed to find a suitable cultivation acceleration method in the library, he wasn't too disappointed. If such methods could really be found so easily, the school wouldn't have kept it out of the curriculum. He was merely trying his luck. Since he couldn't find anything, he could only continue bitterly cultivating the Source Opening Codex.

...

Su Yu grabbed his lunch at school and returned home late in the afternoon. Looking at his empty house, he sank into silence. The house felt so lonely without his father around. In the past, his father would have dinner ready for him by the time he was back from school. He wasn't used to returning to an empty and silent home.

Not in the mood to make dinner, Su Yu sat down on the couch and turned on the television. With the television providing the background noise, he started blanking out. This was an era where there were not many television channels in existence.

In Great Xia, only the Great Xia TV Station and several local stations were available. Due to the effect of the Allheaven Battlefield, the television signals in the Human Realm were limited in coverage. Thus, the people of the different prefectures would generally only be able to gain access to their local stations.

"Recently, traces of the Myriad Race Cult have been discovered in Great Xia. All citizens of Great Xia, please remember to notify your local Windcatcher Department if you encounter any suspicious individuals..."

"Those bastards!"

Su Yu couldn't help but to curse upon hearing the news from the television. Those people were a bunch of bastards. A war was raging between the myriad races. Although the human race was able to resist the other races, humanity was not considered a powerful race among all the races in existence. As a result, some humans had decided to offer their allegiances to the other races instead.

The Myriad Race Cult was not a single cult. Rather, it was a general term used to label the various organizations of humans who had betrayed humanity. Together, these traitors sowed chaos in the Human Realm. Influenced by his father since he was young, Su Yu loathed these traitors of humanity. Looking up at the television, he saw that a square face had appeared on the screen. The face belonged to a middle-aged man clad in red with a heroic appearance.

With a cold expression, the middle-aged man commanded, "Kill!"

Plop!

Next, over a hundred kneeling individuals appeared on the screen. Standing behind the kneeling individuals were some armored soldiers. As they swung their blades down, over a hundred heads dropped to the ground.

"All members of the Myriad Race Cult will be killed without mercy," declared the middle-aged man coldly. He looked straight ahead, as though his gaze could penetrate the television screen itself. "Only death awaits you who have decided to enter my Great Xia. From today onwards, the Martial Dragon Guards will start patrolling the Great Xia. Bastards of Myriad Race Cult, feel free to stay if you're not afraid of death. Let's see how many heads you have to offer us."

Sitting on the couch, Su Yu grew excited.

Xia Longwu! The prefect of Great Xia!

As for the public execution, he did not mind it. Everyone was already used to such sights. In fact, this was not the first time something like this was shown on the television. The human race would treat all captured Myriad Race Cult members the same: execution upon capture. This was an iron-blooded policy aimed at discouraging traitors from appearing through fear. These public executions were meant to serve as a tool to warn everyone to not even think of betraying humanity.

Su Yu did not care about the executions. Instead, most of his attention was on Xia Longwu. This prefect of Great Xia had a forceful personality and a formidable strength. Twenty years ago, he was the commander in charge of the Devil Subduing Army on the Allheaven Battlefield. That was the same army Su Yu's father had served in. Thus, Xia Longwu could be considered as his father's ex superior.

Over the years, Su Long would become incomparably excited every time he saw Xia Longwu on the television. He would excitedly drag Su Yu over and pointed at the television while saying, "That's your old man's ex superior. Back then, he dominated the Allheaven Battlefield and looked at all our enemies with disdain. He slaughtered so many enemies that the opposing armies would frantically flee while tossing their armors and helmets away whenever they encountered us."

As time went by, even Su Yu developed a sense of worship toward this super expert who had dominated the Allheaven Battlefield.

"It would be great if I can be as strong as the prefect," muttered Su Yu longingly.

This was a true expert. In fact, no reigning prefect was a weakling. However, it was worth noting that even among all the prefects, Xia Longwu was still one of the stronger ones. Even more impressive was the fact that Xia Longwu was only about 60 years old and could be considered young for top cultivators.

The other prefects were much older. For example, Zhou Potian of Great Zhou was someone who had lived since the early years of the Anping Calendar. He was over three hundred years old today.

Twenty years ago, Xia Longwu was only over forty years old. At such a young age, he had gained enough strength to lead the Devil Subduing Army. That was what Su Yu was envious of. That was too strong! In this era, forty years old was an extremely young age.

What manner of strength would one need to become the leader of the Devil Subduing Army? Su Yu had no idea. He only knew that one needed to be extremely powerful to do so. That wasn't a feat Xia Longwu had accomplished simply because his grandfather was the legendary Great Xia King who had founded the Great Xia. After all, there were still other living children of prefecture founders around but none had reached the same height.

"Xia Longwu! Martial Dragon War Academy! Martial Dragon Guards!"

Su Yu licked his lips in excitement. He was, after all, still a youngster. Someone like him would naturally be hot-blooded. Had he ever considered joining a war academy in the past? Of course he had!

There were many war academies in Great Xia. Among them, the Great Xia War Academy was one that had existed for over three hundred years. It was the oldest and the most prestigious war academy in Great Xia. However, there was another top-tier war academy in Great Xia. It was the Martial Dragon War Academy.

That was an academy named after Xia Longwu himself, as the Longwu in his name meant martial dragon. It had only been established for fifteen years. In such a short period of time, it had managed to establish itself as one of the best war academies in Great Xia.

A majority of their graduates would end up joining the strongest army in Great Xia: the Martial Dragon Guards.

It was said that even Nanyuan City's mayor had come from the Martial Dragon Guards. From that, one could see just how impressive that army was. Su Yu's father was a soldier from the Devil Subduing Army. Back then when he first retired, he had tried joining the Martial Dragon Guards to continue serving under his ex superior. Unfortunately, he was rejected by Martial Dragon Guards. He was too old and too weak for such an elite army.

Naturally, Su Long was extremely furious to be rejected, to the point he unleashed a string of profanities at the point of rejection. Naturally, the target of his profanities was not Xia Longwu. Rather, it was the recruiter. Why would they reject him?

It was rumored that a team of Martial Dragon Guards was stationed at Nanyuan City, but Su Yu had no idea if that was true. He had never seen those guys in the city before.

"Great Xia War Academy, Martial Dragon War Academy...the Great Xia War Academy mainly focused on producing soldiers to serve the front line. Their graduates will not have much chance to return home after graduation. As for the Martial Dragon War Academy..."

Su Yu's eyes lit up. The Martial Dragon War Academy was different. That was because their students were considered the reserve force of the Martial Dragon Guards. Of course, the students of Martial Dragon War Academy would also be sent to the front line like those from the other war academies. However, the Martial Dragon Guards' main task was to protect their homeland. In other words, they could remain in Great Xia most of the time.

Of course, the moment a major conflict broke out, the elite Martial Dragon Guards would also be the first to be deployed to the Allheaven Battlefield. If the Devil Subduing Army was considered a standing army, the Martial Dragon Guards could be considered a field army.

"They have fewer limitations and more freedom. In exchange, they will be conducting the most dangerous missions in battles. If I wish to enter a war academy, the Martial Dragon War Academy would be a good choice."

Unfortunately, the Martial Dragon War Academy was much harder to join than the other war academies. Due to its nature as the reserve force for the Martial Dragon Guards, they were far stricter in recruitment. Rubbing his face, Su Yu smiled helplessly. Joining the Martial Dragon Guards would only be a dream for him. It would be difficult for him to join even a regular war academy, much less the Martial Dragon War Academy. What was the point of thinking all that?

"Is the Myriad Race Cult courting death? Why would they enter Great Xia? Even the Martial Dragon Guards have been deployed. I wonder if I can see them here at Nanyuan..."

Su Yu wasn't too worried about the Myriad Race Cult. Those people were all akin to rats that could only scurry about in the dark. They would only dare to scheme about while in hiding. With the Martial Dragon Guards deployed, these people would probably go even deeper into hiding. How would they still dare to show themselves? Even if they did show up, Su Yu had nothing to fear.

This was an era where almost the entirety of the Human Realm had been militarized. There might not be any Infinite Strength Realm experts in the neighborhood, but they still have some Great Strength Realm experts around.

His father was a veteran that had rejoined the army, but there were still several veterans in the neighborhood that had not returned to the army. If the Myriad Race Cult really decided to send several Great Strength cultivators over, it would be no different than suicide.

Those old veterans were all retired from the battlefield. Each and every one of them was someone whose hands were drenched in blood. They wouldn't hesitate to kill. A single shout in the neighborhood would be enough to instantly summon about seven or eight of them.

...

Done with watching the television, Su Yu had a simple meal of instant noodles before washing up and practicing the Source Opening Codex. That night, he went to bed early. After all, his sleep would be disturbed by nightmares. The only way for him to get enough rest was to actually get more rest. Su Yu had determined that his nightmares would generally start around midnight. Prior to that, his sleep would be relatively peaceful.

...

Night.

Darkness.

Dreamland.

A scene that had repeated itself countless times was once again reappearing. A massive flying monster was chasing after Su Yu.

"Fuck!"

There was nothing Su Yu hated more than the flying monsters. They were too fast for him to escape from. He had encountered land-based monsters before, and things were definitely better during those encounters. After all, he would be able to escape the fate of being caught and eaten every now and then when facing those monsters.

Meanwhile, he had never escaped from the flying monsters once. Every single time, he would be caught and eaten before waking up from the torturous nightmare. He hated these flying bastards.

This nightmare was no exception to the norm. The massive flying monster was very fast. The complicated terrain of the dreamland posed no challenge for the monster. Slowly, it got closer and closer to Su Yu. While running, he did not forget to look back at the monster. He wanted to see if it was one he recognized.

"Huh?"

There were a lot of different flying races in existence and Su Yu only knew about a dozen of them. This time, the monster chasing after him actually looked familiar. The monster's appearance was blurry, but he could vaguely see a wart on the monster's massive head.

"This is...an iron-winged bird! Holy shit! After so many years, I finally met a monster I know!"

Su Yu grew excited. He knew eighteen different languages, but that did not mean that he had actually met the races whose languages he had learned even after including all the monsters he had encountered in his dreams. He only had a vague idea of what these races looked like and had only learned their languages because there were some other people in Nanyuan Secondary School who knew these languages as well.

He had never encountered an iron-winged bird before but he knew its language! This was one of the eighteen languages he had mastered, and he was not the only person in his school that knew the language. After all, the iron-winged bird race was commonly utilized by the various powerful races on the Allheaven Battlefield as the air force.

Su Yu hurriedly looked back and shouted, "Weiyi xijiu yun(Why are you chasing me)?"

The gigantic bird did not reply and continued chasing him like it hadn't heard anything.

"Luyi jiyou(We're friends)!"

Still no response. Su Yu cursed inwardly. Looking at the descending claws of the monster, he knew that he was going to die yet again. It was very likely that this was an iron-winged bird. However, it did not seem to be sentient. After all, this was only something conjured in his dream.

Crack!

Unsurprisingly, intense pain erupted on Su Yu's head as it was crushed by the bird. Slowly, the dreamland dissipated around him. He knew that he was on the verge of waking up due to the pain he was feeling. Right that moment, the massive bird suddenly shouted with a shrill voice.

"Moonlight!"

Su Yu was stunned. Next, he woke up drenched in sweat.

"Moonlight...no, in its tongue, it means blood!"

Su Yu's eyes widened. He heard what the bird said! Although the iron-winged bird had managed to kill him, it seemed furious, as though it had failed to obtain what it wanted.

"Blood! It was chasing after me for my blood!"

The bird had spoken using the iron-winged bird language, so Su Yu was able to understand it. In the past, the monsters had spoken to him as well, but he couldn’t understand any of the words spoken to him since those weren't the languages he had learned. That wasn't the case this time!

"Blood. Blood is their goal? What does that mean? Do they want my blood? But I would bleed in the dream whenever I was injured. That had never changed anything. What is the meaning of that exactly?"

Su Yu was still in discomfort from his recent nightmare, but he ignored it and sank into deep thought.

"It wanted blood, but it couldn't get my blood from my dreams. Or maybe my blood isn't the point here? Perhaps...I need the blood of its race?"

"The blood of an iron-winged bird? What will happen if I can get some? A dream is a dream. Even if I can get my hands on some, can I even bring it into the dream?"

Su Yu rubbed his temple with his sweaty hand. Now wasn't the time to be bothered about his sweat. Something seemed to be clearing up about his dreams. This was the very first time in so many years that he had come so close to learning something new about his dreams. His efforts in learning the many different languages had finally paid off. Even if he had only gotten a single word from his dream, it was still worth it.

"I can't stop here. I need to try something. What will happen if I can get some iron-winged bird blood? But I'll encounter a different monster tomorrow. Will the iron-winged bird blood still work tomorrow? Screw it."

Su Yu sat up on the bed as he reached a decision to do something about what he had learned. He was sick of being killed repeatedly in his dreams. He needed to solve this issue as soon as possible. It felt really terrible being killed in his dreams every single day.

"I'll go to the Xia Trade Company when the sun rises. They have all sorts of things for sale there. They might even have some iron-winged bird blood in stock. After all, the iron-winged bird is rather common on the Allheaven Battlefield. I might be able to buy some there."

Having made his choice, Su Yu was no longer in the mood to continue sleeping. He waited in excitement for the sun to rise. Even if this clue only had a tiny chance of deciphering his dreams, he would still be willing to try it. He was sick of being tortured every time he went to bed.