The Undying Immortal System
Chapter 324: Life 77, Age 31, Martial King Peak

Shen took me deeper into his mountain abode, to a perfect replica of Jin’s anti-Sovereign conference room. After tapping the formation in the center of the table to activate the room’s defenses, he turned and looked at me expectantly.

Reaching into my inner world, I pulled out a tray containing all the orbs that Shen had accumulated and placed it in front of him. Shen, wisely, did not rush to activate these orbs. Instead, he picked them up one at a time and carefully examined all of the inscriptions on each orb. Of course, since I hadn’t even considered tampering with these orbs, there was nothing for him to find, so he eventually chose to absorb each set of memories one after the other.

When he was done, Shen closed his eyes and sat in silence for several long minutes as he did his best to digest everything that he had learned. Upon opening his eyes, he stroked his chin and studied me. “You used the formation?”

I nodded.

“It worked?”

I nodded again.

Shen began rolling his fingers on the table. “It wasn’t enough. What did I miss?”

“The other Sovereigns—”

Shen raised a hand to cut me off. “Be careful with what you say. I am only an old researcher who is wasting his days studying useless formations based upon nothing but wild theories and speculations. I have zero desire to involve myself in… politics. Just tell me things that will… help my research.”

I lowered my head slowly in acquiescence as I thought through the situation.

The conference room should have prevented the Sovereigns from spying on us, so why was Shen being evasive? Because he was doing mental gymnastics to work around some kind of Oath. He likely wasn’t able to take any actions intended to harm either the Emissary or the Sovereigns. So, he had to convince himself that he was only engaged in theoretical research.

“Emperor Shen… one of the… complications with the formation is that it is impossible to know if it is functioning correctly. Even if it works when first activated, will it continue functioning after being moved into a… storage bag? Certain storage bags have… barriers in place that might interfere with its operation. However, if the formation isn’t stored away properly… an accident might cause it to become damaged.”

When I was finished speaking… Shen could only stare at me.

His cheek twitched several times, and he tried to open his mouth, but nothing came out. Understanding his dilemma, I did my best to come up with a solution.

A certain idea popped into my mind, and I waved to dismiss the topic at hand. “Let’s talk about something else. Do you have any… prisoners? People who have committed heinous crimes? People who need to be… removed from society?”

Shen nodded.

I gave him a slightly evil grin. “Bring one of them here. I need to test a theory.”

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Oaths… How exactly did they work?

In Eight Flower, I was told that the Oath Stone formed a connection between the kingdom’s Bagua Formation, the Heavenly Dao, and the person swearing the Oath. When an Oath was broken, the Heavenly Dao would recognize it, send a signal to the formation, and the formation would mete out the appropriate punishment.

Because of this, an Oath sworn on Eight Flower’s Oath Stone wouldn’t hold much weight once a person left the kingdom.

The Oath Stone that I had gotten from Emperor Li was a bit different. Oaths sworn on it were effective everywhere on the continent. It, seemingly, didn’t rely on any kind of formation. As far as I could tell, the Heavenly Dao punished oath-breaking directly.

In both cases, though, it was said to be the Heavenly Dao that determined whether or not an Oath had been broken. So, what would happen if an Oath were broken outside the Heavenly Dao’s purview? What would happen if someone broke an Oath within my inner world?

This question had been rattling around in my brain ever since I had made the members of my clan swear Oaths of Secrecy. Had they been able to break those Oaths while they were in my inner world? It was a possibility that I had considered, but it wasn’t one that I had been overly concerned about since all the people in my inner world had been trusted members of my clan.

But… could I use this as a way of letting Shen sidestep his Oath? It seemed possible, but it needed to be tested.

When Shen brought in a condemned criminal, I didn’t ask what the person had done or why he was locked up. It was enough for me to know that the world would be better off without him.

Shen forced the criminal’s hand onto my Oath Stone, and I looked the man dead in the eye.

“Swear that you will never cut your hair.”

The man looked at me with wild, crazed eyes and initially refused. Shen made him think better of that.

When the Oath was in place, I tossed him into my inner world. Once he was inside, a couple of people from my clan ‘encouraged’ him to cut his hair.

Nothing happened.

I looked at Shen, nodded, and followed him to the entrance of his cave. There, I pulled the man out, tossed him to the ground, and quickly backed away.

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Again, nothing happened.

After putting the man to rest, I then followed Shen back to the conference room and pulled him into my inner world.

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Shen stared at the corpse of the Emissary that was lying atop his formation.

“So, you killed him, but you weren’t sure if pulling him into your soul space would disrupt the effects of the formation.” Shen rubbed his chin in thought. “I’m not entirely sure about that myself. The formation traps a small portion of a person’s soul upon their death. This maintains the connection to their Soul Lamp and keeps it from going out. Will transferring the formation into this space transfer the soul along with it? Would pulling a soul fragment into a place shielded from the Heavenly Dao cut its connection to the Soul Lamp? I really can’t say.”

I nodded to myself, having expected this answer. Using a brush, I scribbled a quick reply.

If we can’t be certain, then we can’t take the risk. The formation will have to remain in the outside world. We either need to find a way to protect it from enemy Sovereigns, or we need to ensure that there aren’t any enemy Sovereigns that we need to protect it from.

Shen waved offhandedly. “Just tell me the plan.”

We can protect it from the Sovereigns with a formation like the one in the conference room. It will prevent portals from forming, and that will stop anyone from being able to sneak attack the formation behind our backs.

She shook his head. “That’s… probably not going to happen. I’ve tried to study that formation in the past, but without a diagram to work from, such a task is beyond even my capabilities.”

I let out a sigh. Being able to block portals would have been nice.

Then we’ll just have to eliminate all our enemies at once. I want to create an enlarged version of the formation—one that can serve as a fighting stage between us and all of the Sovereigns at once. Then, as long as we get them on top of it, we’ll just need to worry about killing them. We won’t have to worry about arranging their corpses on top before they die.

Shen looked at the ground, and a pensive expression appeared on his face.

“That… might be possible, but it’ll be difficult. The formation that I gave you last time took me hundreds of years to make. Making an even larger one…”

Don’t worry, you’ll have a bit of help.

Flexing my mind, I pulled half a dozen men and women out of my inner world and then immediately sent them right back inside. They appeared only a few steps away from Shen.

Two Formation Kings, Four Formation Emperors. None of them are Peak Emperors, but they should be able to help you with the grunt work.

Shen snorted. “Pull me out for a second.”

I did as he asked, and Shen reappeared in the conference room.

After getting his bearings, he walked over to where he had left his storage bag and pulled out a set of scrolls. “Send me back in.”

Once back inside, he unrolled one of the scrolls and placed it where everyone could see. “This is the schematic for the original Rank 7 formation that we’ll be trying to recreate.”

I tried to examine it, and I felt a hint of understanding on the edge of my consciousness, but the moment I tried to put it into words, the thoughts flew from my mind. Looking at the people surrounding Shen, I saw that I wasn’t the only one affected in this way.

After making his point, Shen put away that scroll and unrolled several more. “I’ve done my best to ‘flatten’ the original formation into something that can be created as an Emperor, but it is still a Rank 7 formation. It has just been redesigned so that one doesn’t need to be a Sovereign to make it.”

I understand your point. I still might have a way to make this work, but I’ll need to focus on advancing a bit before it becomes feasible.

On that note, do you have any recommendations for core disciples that I could team up with? I need to find someone who can bring me up to Heaven City as soon as possible.

Shen chuckled. “That’s not exactly the kind of thing that I pay attention to. I don’t—”

Shen cut himself off, and a malicious glint appeared in his eye. “I do have one idea for you. Go find Jian DuJian. He’s a joke of a metal cultivator who completely failed his ascent last time. He led 15 Emperors onto the path to Heaven City, and 14 of them died. Only he and one other person were able to survive. But with you joining, he should be able to succeed.”

That… Wouldn’t that be a bit risky? If only two people survived, there wouldn’t be any room for error.

Shen shrugged. “He’s the only one I know to suggest. He should be making the ascent in a couple of years, and based on his personality, he should still be in need of teammates. You could try joining a more powerful group, but you might need to wait several decades for one to become available.”

I shook my head. I could at least give the guy a chance.

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After handing over memory orbs for Emperors Jin and Li, I left the Earth Peak and followed Shen’s advice. I went to meet Jian DuJian.

As expected, the guy was a rather large prick. Just scheduling a meeting with him was tedious, and if I hadn’t started gaining a bit of renown as an expert with formations, it likely wouldn’t have happened at all. Negotiating a deal with him was even more of a trial, and, in the end, the agreement we reached was anything but fair.

To become a member of Jian’s team and gain the opportunity to purchase Emperor-level karmic energy, I would need to provide him with ten free Rank 5 formations. Then, after ascending, I would be required to provide him with five Rank 6 formations for each year that we remained in Earth City.

These terms were, quite frankly, absurd, but considering that Jian was my quickest ticket to Heaven City, I was willing to accept them.

What I didn’t expect was the way Jian used these free formations as a way to earn contribution points. Instead of requesting formations for himself, he sold off slots for free formations to various Kings and Lords from around the sect. As a result, I ended up having to front the cost of building grand defensive formations in ten different cities.

This irked me more than just a little, but Jian at least kept to his part of the bargain and gave me a slot to purchase the karmic energy that I needed.

Once I had it, I entered seclusion and fine-tuned my Rank 6 core as best as I could. Without the ability to analyze Rank 6 techniques, this was rather difficult, but my final creation was at least a few percentage points better than my last attempt.

After breaking through, I exited seclusion and found that Jian was just as unreasonable as before. The five Rank 6 formations that he requested each required the use of exceptionally expensive materials. He was purposefully milking me for as much as he could.

I was willing to grin and bear this since Jian was supposed to be my fastest route to Heaven City, but at the end of two years, he still showed no sign of preparing to make the ascent.

Three years passed. Then, four.

At the beginning of the fifth year, Jian finally announced our imminent departure. However, he insisted that I hand over my annual fee before we did so. Not willing to cause a commotion right before we left, I complied with his demands and handed over the requested formations with a smile on my face.

The next month, we headed out.

Jian left Earth City with a total of 15 Emperors by his side. Only Jian, me, and one other managed to survive the paths’ trials. This was a disaster, but as three paths had been completed, it was technically a success.

However, while three of us survived the Path, only two of us made it to Heaven City. After the trials were complete, Jian met with an unfortunate, fatal accident. Thankfully, though, he left us his storage bag to remember him by.

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