Star Odyssey

Chapter 3149: Megalith Poison

In the past, Bi Lan might have tried to persuade Bi Teng, but there was no longer any need for such tactics. Why bother with someone who was already as good as dead?

Bi Teng suppressed his anger and stomped off to Madam Nalan's quarters. Soon, he saw the woman herself.

"Fuxue, this was all my fault. I didn't look into the matter thoroughly and misunderstood things. I apologize," Bi Teng said while just barely keeping his anger from surfacing. He succeeded in making his apology seem quite sincere.

Madam Nalan gave the man an odd look. "There’s no need for you to be polite. We're all on the same side."

Bi Teng was taken aback. Madam Nalan had never spoken to him in such a manner before.

"Come in and sit for a while," Madam Nalan said while stepping aside.

Bi Teng felt quite puzzled. He gave Madam Nalan a second glance, desire flickering across his eyes. This woman was incredibly tempting, and Bi Teng had been interested in her ever since she had joined the Merchant Exchange. However, because of their respective positions in the company, he had buried that desire deep. What was going on today?

He entered Madam Nalan's quarters, and she placed a hand on the man’s shoulder. He felt surrounded by her fragrance, and Bi Teng did not dare to move. He wondered if he had walked into a trap. Could the Heavens Sect be using the woman to tempt him into providing more resources? Yes, that had to be it. He quickly tried to stand up and leave the room.

Suddenly, he was struck by a sharp pain, which was followed by a sense of numbness and paralysis.

A spatial diablo appeared nearby as it tried to isolate Bi Teng.

However, not even the spatial diablo was able to last longer than a moment under Madam Nalan's hand, and it shattered instantly.

Bi Teng stared up at Madam Nalan in horror. "Fuxue, you...?"

Madam Nalan's face shifted. "I’m not Fuxue. You can call me E' Ji."

...

The Heavens Sect soon received the resources from the Merchant Exchange.

"Dao Monarch, I'm going to return to the Merchant Exchange now," Madam Nalan announced with a bow.

Lu Yin replied, "You need to report any information about Aeternus targeting the Merchant Exchange back to me. That’s very important."

"I understand," Madam Nalan replied. She gave another bow and then left.

With the situation with the Merchant Exchange settled, Lu Yin just needed to await news from Whitecloud City.

The Lord of Lightning was currently fully occupied with the Ancient Thunder Locust, which made it quite difficult for Jiang Qingyue or anyone else to speak to the man.

While he waited, Lu Yin made a trip to the Three Monarchs Universe, hoping to find Luo Shan. Unfortunately, the man could not be found.

Luo Shan’s name had also been on the list of traitors, and Lu Yin could not trust anyone completely.

No one could prove that Luo Shan had betrayed humanity or that he was a spy, but the Monarch did not believe that Lu Yin would implicitly trust him. So, he had chosen to disappear.

As for Mr. Daheng, he was also on the Endless Frontier. The man was backed by Astral Anura, though aside from Luo Shan and Lu Yin, no one else knew of that matter.

Mr. Daheng felt confident that Luo Shan would not reveal the matter to anyone, and the Arborean had no idea that Lu Yin was aware of their connection.

Through Mr. Daheng, it might be possible for Lu Yin to locate Astral Anura’s lair.

Lu Yin harbored a heavy grudge against Astral Anura. Aeternus frequently hired the toad to harass humanity, but hiring Astral Anura indicated that Aeternus lacked sufficient power on their own. If Astral Anura could be dealt with, Lu Yin would gain an even greater advantage for humanity in the war against Aeternus.

Time passed, but there was no news from Whitecloud City. Instead, Lu Yin received terrible news.

The Five Spirits Alliance and the Luna Alliance had both been attacked Aeternus, and they had suffered heavy losses.

Upon hearing the dreadful news, Lu Yin hurried to the Ice Spirit Tribe’s universe.

The Five Spirits Alliance and the Luna Alliance were outside civilizations that also fought against Aeternus, and they had previously interacted with the Origin Universe. Any attack on those alliances would prompt an immediate response from the Origin Universe.

Unfortunately, they had been too late.

Aeternus had only attacked once, but that single assault had resulted in the death of the Luna Alliance’s Yue Shen, as well as three of the Five Spirits Alliance’s leaders. Specifically, the Fire Lord, the Lightning Lord, and the Wood Lord had all died.

This devastating news caught the Sixverse Association off guard and completely ruined Lu Yin’s previously good mood.

He arrived in the Ice Spirit Tribe’s universe, mostly worried about the Iceheart. Fortunately, the Iceheart remained unharmed, though the Ice Lord had been gravely injured. Still, he had survived.

Lu Yin quickly found the Ice Lord. “What happened?”

The Ice Lord looked distressed. “Poison.”

“Poison?” This was unexpected.

Lu Yin felt rather confused. Eight sequence powerhouses from the Five Spirits Alliance and the Luna Alliance had instantly suffered heavy casualties from a single attack from Aeternus. This was highly unusual.

From what Lu Yin understood, even if Aeternus launched a unified attack under the Divine Commandment with their full, united forces, they should not have targeted the Five Spirits Alliance, but rather an outside civilization. This was what they had done with the Nine-Star Civilization. Logically, Ye Sheng or The Abandoned should have been targeted next. After all, the Five Spirits Alliance had five sequence powerhouses, which should have been enough to resist the attack long enough for allies to arrive.

If Lu Yin had known that Aeternus had the ability to instantly severely damage both the Five Spirits Alliance and the Luna Alliance, he would have devised countermeasures.

After all, he was not currently able to contact Ye Sheng or the Nine-Star Civilization.

The Ice Lord was panting as he asked, “Have you heard of Megalith Poison?”

Lu Yin’s eyes narrowed, and he instantly understood. He had nearly forgotten that Aeternus was constantly researching Time Poison and Vitality Poison, both of which were extremely dangerous.

For a long period of time, Lu Yin had been on guard against the usage of poison, but as time passed and his cultivation had improved, he had stopped considering poisons as real threats.

Unexpectedly, Aeternus had used poison to instantly cripple the Five Spirits Alliance and the Luna Alliance, and it was even a poison that Lu Yin had never heard of before: Megalith Poison.

It seemed that this Megalith Poison was rather similar to the Vitality Poison and Time Poison that Aeternus had developed previously.

“We never anticipated something like this Megalith Poison existing. The people of our Five Spirits Alliance are born of nature and are not human. We never imagined that we could be poisoned. As soon as we are poisoned, our strength and vitality are quickly sapped away. The condition is practically irreversible, much like the condition of the woman who’s frozen in the Iceheart. Only exceptionally strong cultivators can treat this poison, and even peak powerhouses can just barely manage to stay alive.

“As soon as I realized that I had been poisoned, I used the froststone that you gave me to freeze myself and then boosted my sequence particles with it. Without that, I would have also died during Aeternus’s assault. I don’t know how the Earth Lord survived, but the other three were all poisoned before being killed by Aeternus’s experts.” The Ice Lord’s voice was weak.

Lu Yin’s expression fell even further. The fact that both the poison drained both strength and vitality made it even more vicious than Vitality Poison. “How were you poisoned?”

The Ice Lord shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“Do you know the number of the Megalith Poison that was used?” Lu Yin asked again.

The Ice Lord looked confused. “Which number?”

Lu Yin pondered for a moment. All of Aeternus’s poisons were numbered, and the lower the number, the more potent the poison. He had first learned about Vitality Poison because of Ming Zhaoshu's death. Both Time Poison and Vitality Poison were numbered.

If the poison that had been used against the Ice Lord and others was numbered zero, then it would be at least somewhat reassuring, as it would mean that the Aeternals had concluded their research into this Megalith Poison and that it could not kill sequence powerhouses. However, if the poison used was not numbered zero, then that would present a significant problem.

Time Poison had once crippled the entire Origin Universe and the Three Monarchs Universe when it was used on a large scale. Vitality Poison had not yet been used on such a large scale.

This attack served as a warning for Lu Yin. If they did not prepare for such poisons forthwith, humanity could potentially face a calamity at any moment.

In a way, Lu Yin felt relieved. In order to kill four sequence powerhouses, Aeternus had been forced to reveal a powerful trump card.

Lu Yin let out a breath as he looked toward the Iceheart.

Soon, Jiang Qingyue also arrived in the Ice Spirit Tribe’s universe. She had made her way over as soon as she had received word of the attack.

The Ice Lord had been poisoned by Megalith Poison, which caused him to constantly lose both vitality and energy. He needed to either find an antidote to the poison, or use his sequence particles to freeze himself. He was not capable of combat for the time being.

It was very likely that the Earth Lord, Moon Fairy, and Moon Ghost were all in the same condition as well.

The Megalith Poison’s potency was readily seen.

It was vital that they create an antidote quickly. Without one, there was a grave risk of four more sequence powerhouses either dying or being crippled.

With the Five Spirits Alliance’s universe being connected to the Whitecloud City, there was no need to worry about the Aeternals attacking again.

Even if Aeternus had the strength to attack the Five Spirits Alliance again, they could not do so anytime soon. If they possessed such a level of strength, Aeternus would have already attacked.

The top priority was to deal with the Megalith Poison while staying on guard against Time Poison and Vitality Poison.

Lu Yin immediately called the Sixverse Association’s best healers to the Heavens Sect so that they could examine the Megalith Poison that was afflicting the Ice Lord and the others. The largest obstacle was the fact that the Ice Lord and Earth Lord were not human, which made it very difficult for humans to treat them.

With no other choice, Lu Yin ordered the Sixverse Association to search for Moon Fairy and Moon Ghost, who were also suffering from the poison.

The women had escaped and survived, but they were likely in dire condition. If not, they would have already returned. It was possible that they were on the brink of death.

After several days, Lu Yin received word from another universe. Moon Fairy and Moon Ghost were being pursued by Aeternus. Fortunately, Lu Yin’s efforts to find the two women led to them being rescued. Their rescuer was none other than Sovereign Lotus.

Sovereign Lotus was quite familiar with the outsider powerhouses.

Saving the two women was a rather impressive achievement.

When Moon Fairy and Moon Ghost arrived at the Heavens Sect, Lu Yin barely recognized them. They were both extremely weak, their faces were pale, and their bodies were badly wounded.

Even so, neither woman was in a hurry to recover. Their injuries were not life-threatening, and the real danger that they faced was the Megalith Poison. It was a slow, torturous affliction that pushed them closer to death with each passing moment. The weakening of their cultivation alone was a form of torture.

Lu Yin did not hesitate to have all of their skilled healers examine the women’s blood and any other indicators that could help to identify the Megalith Poison.

Despite the thorough examinations, the healers were at a loss. They were completely unable to determine the nature of the Megalith Poison.

Master Qing Cao did manage to offer Lu Yin some important insight. "To treat the Megalith Poison, you first need to understand just what it is.

"You mentioned that Time Poison can make the time in a universe either speed up or slow down, making it nearly impossible for the people there to cultivate.

"Vitality Poison drains a person’s life away in a manner that can never be restored.

"In that case, what is this Megalith Poison doing? Is it draining their energy, vitality, or is there some other hidden danger to the poison?"

Lu Yin understood the truth in these words. Without understanding the Megalith Poison, how could they hope to treat it?

Soon after that, Jiang Chen arrived, a grim expression on his face. "My father sent me to tell you this. ‘We will meet in the First Scourge. The Five Spirits Alliance must be avenged.’"

Lu Yin replied, "Please ask the Lord of Lightning to wait. We need to first understand this Megalith Poison. If we just charge into the First Scourge and end up being poisoned, it could be disastrous."

"Is the poison that dangerous? Could it affect even my father?" Jiang Chen was doubtful.

Lu Yin responded solemnly, "The Ice Lord and all the others who were poisoned are sequence powerhouses. I don’t believe that the Lord of Lightning is above that level."

Jiang Chen nodded. "You have a point. I'll go back and tell my father to wait. We can't let Aeternus gain the upper hand. But how long will this take? We can't drag things out indefinitely."

Lu Yin thought for a moment. "It shouldn’t take long. I was already planning to attack the First Scourge."

Jiang Chen gritted his teeth, anger flashing across his eyes. "This is no longer just about your plans! Aeternus killed the Fire Lord and others. My father won’t let this go."