The entire world, from the particulates in air, the vapor of blood slowly ascending according to the natural law of condensation, the soundwaves of a soldier's death throes, the last flicking flame of life within the eyes of a man with a sword plunged in his heart, to the violent aura suffused with rage swiftly descending from the sky had all been plunged into a state of absolute stillness.
Yet there was a single figure amongst these paused existences that was unhindered by the Heavenly Daos' restrictive power. It was none other than Wei Wuyin.
While his eyes remained closed, he no longer needed to heavily resist the freezing force of the Heavenly Daos, his Astral Souls, notably Kratos and Eden, had already gotten extremely used to its occurrence that he had been paused for less than a millisecond of actual time. With his mind, body, and spirits freed, he shrugged his shoulders.
"Its a little too unfortunate that the stress on my body couldn't be paused," Wei Wuyin commented with a wry smile. He was currently exerting the spiritual strength of all three of his Astral Souls, causing his physical body to be subjected to an extremely high level of stress. It felt as if losing his True Draconic Form would cause his physical body to explode.
Fortunately, despite the extraordinary pain with every breath and movement, he was used to such hell-rising pain. As someone who was burnt alive, almost crushed by a Black Hole, and suffered the heartfelt pain of losing his entire family, he could resist both the physical and mental suffering this pain caused with relative ease.
Just as he was about to inspect the surroundings, he stilled. Not due to the Heavenly Daos' strange force, but out of shock. He realized that his Divine Saber Astral Soul, King, was still in full effect. It wasn't affected by the freezing force!
Unfathomable levels of shock shook his heart, unable to comprehend why this change had occurred. When he investigated King, attempting to communicate with it, he found King was unresponsive yet fully active. It was surrounded by its Saber Annihilation Light in the form of a ring, and it revolved around its Astral Soul's saber form like a Mystic Radiance Belt.
However, when he observed Ori, his Divine Elemental Astral Soul, it was still and silent. There was no strange ring formed from his Primary Light or any activity to speak of. Unable to immediately grasp the difference, he calmed his heart and decided to investigate more on the cause later.
RUMBLE! RUMBLE! BOOM!
Wei Wuyin was unable to open his eyes, yet he could feel the thunderous accumulation occurring up above. "When I killed Yuan Longshi, Eden and Kraros weren't able to immediately break the stillness effect of the Heavenly Daos. Because of that, I was frozen for an indeterminate amount of time while that one meter thundercloud had gathered."
Thinking back to that time, he couldn't help but sigh. Yuan Longshi was his first time killing a Blessed. He had thought it was the Unnamed Commander before, but after all the evidence that suggested he was just a sinner that had slain a Blessed, he couldn't help but feel quite peculiar.
Right after doing so, Wei Wuyin was struck almost instantly by a cloud of lightning that was like endless eels cackling with thunderous booms. He hadn't been able to react before he was struck.
Feeling the prickly electricity in the stilled air, hearing the roiling of the clouds and the thunderous booms, he now realized that the Heavenly Punishment was building up again. When he had broken the bindings before, he felt as if he had been subjected to rigor mortis. So if he considered timing wise, it likely took time for it to accumulate. Considering Yuan Longshi had given roughly equivalent to a Karmic Surge, the lightning punishment must be a specific punishment for those of a certain level.
"Yet there's always been something that's bothered me…" Wei Wuyin was once again reminded about the Scripture of Sin. The Heavenly Daos were the cleansers of Karmic Sin, so why or how could it deliver Karmic Sin to others? It seemed detrimental to its purpose, and while killing a Blessed was horrific in its view, there was no indication within the Three Thousand Commandments of the Heavenly Daos that stated that it was an Act of Sin.
The Heavenly Daos were unfair, yet it was also fair.
If it wasn't the Heavenly Daos, then what was creating Karmic Sin? And what was Karmic Sin and Karmic Luck, exactly? After all, the Black Skeleton was capable of delivering Karmic Luck to him in his early years, and she seemed like the Envoy of the First Sinner, or the First Sinner themselves, so could these two things be separate things?
All of this was extremely confusing. The more he thought about it, the more he thought that there was a crucial key piece missing from the answer. Perhaps something extremely simple, in fact.
Wei Wuyin determined that his question was logical, but his assumptions weren't. Dismissing these chaotic and difficult thoughts, he realized from the thunderous booms that more time was needed before the lightning fell.
He decided to analyze the memories of Jing Jiu. After reading his entire life, Wei Wuyin had heavy suspicions that he was a Blessed. The issue was that, be it Lin Ming, Long Chen, or Yuan Longshi, he was unable to tell at first glance. However, the more time he spent with them, the greater his thoughts of them being Blessed, like a humming echo in the back of his head. Due to this, he decided to outright kill Jing Jiu to verify his own theory of the Heavenly Daos methods.
His first suspicion of Lin Ming was after a series of events, such as the mysterious woman behind him, and Yuan Longshi had to do with how unfathomably talented and lucky he'd been throughout his life, establishing an incredible legend through continuous conflict and surviving outrageous events.
When he inspected Jing Jiu's memories, he learned that there were remarkable similarities with Yuan Longshi's life, if not the exact same type of Blessed. The type of fortunate individual that grabs opportunities in life and death scenarios, not in women like Long Chen or sporadic opportunities that require willpower, means, focus, patience, and intelligence to grasp like himself.
He decided to call these types of Blessed, War Blessed. They generated their fortune through continuous conflict, oftentimes outrageously brutal or acquiring benefits from other's corpses, such as Yuan Longshi obtaining the Bloodforge Mystic Method after killing his hated enemy. For example, this very Battlefield was an extreme example. The Heavenly Daos presented these types of Blessed with opportunities to earn through killing.
Considering he decided to name one, he decided to name them all by his own categorization.
Long Chen, those who gathered elite talents and derived fortune from them, not just females, he decided to call these types of Blessed individuals: Interlinked Blessed. They established relationships and benefited off these relationships, but it also placed a huge emphasis on their Karmic Luck due to their reliance. A Blessed had to make full use of their relationship to benefit, either immediately or long-term.
He knew of three events where Long Chen's Karmic Luck had faltered, unable to save those he'd form Interlinked Relationships with. The first was Wu Jiao. The Ancestral King of Wu turned his allies into bloody mist before his eyes. The second was Lin Ziyan, who suffered almost full crippling. The third was Lian Yu, who died in his arms.
He was aware that when these types of Blessed had low Karmic Luck, these Interlinked relationships became extremely detrimental, perhaps even being sacrificed deliberately by the Heavenly Daos to ensure its future plans to benefit them took effect. He was unsure exactly.
As for himself, he knew he was an Exploitative Blessed. These Blessed's objectives were to exploit fortuitous encounters, be it people, things, or events. However, unlike the other two, his opportunities weren't clear-cut, allowing him to either obtain nothing, something, or possibly everything.
He was unable to determine Lin Ming's Blessed type, but it wasn't War, Interlinked, or Exploitative. It might be a mixture of all three, perhaps, or an entirely different one. Yet all Blessed seemed to have the unique benefit to those around them. Those that had Karmic Ties with them, such as Xue Yifei with Yuan Longshi, Bai Lin with himself, or Long Chen's allies
After settling his thoughts, he felt like his understanding of the Heavenly Daos were clearer in this frozen stillness. Was the clarity of his thoughts due to being here? Being beneath its fiery fury that wished to strike him down?
He couldn't help but chuckle while shaking his head, dismissively thinking that it felt very similar to when he comprehends Intents. However, that was a little silly, right? Could the Heavenly Daos be comprehended?
Ignoring this thought, he recalled Jing Jiu's treasures and means. Wei Wuyin was fiercely taken aback by the Anti-Spirit Pulse Flags that dissolved his Spiritual Strength, but the talisman he had, the Azure Demigod Radiance Talisman, a Mystic-Graded Talisman of exceptionally high-grade that could outright kill a Demi-Mortal Lord if caught off-guard.
Fortunately, it was damaged, and it could only reach five meters in effective radius. When Wei Wuyin arrived at the five meter distance, Kratos had informed him that the void was rippling strangely. He realized there was a trap being laid for him. So he temporarily camouflaged himself against the void and sent a Void Image in his stead.
The Void Concealment was an extremely difficult Bloodline Ability and he couldn't move fast while using it or sustain it for longer than a few dozen seconds before being forcefully expelled. Moreover, it didn't allow him to merge with the Void, so he couldn't use it to dodge an attack. Not yet, anyway.
But it was enough to fool Jing Jiu.
When Jing Jiu activated the talisman in his ah-ha moment, Wei Wuyin had already retreated in full force with the Infinite Void Wings. Then, used Void Concealment again to arrive before Jing Jiu without being noticed. If the Battlefield wasn't so restrictive to spiritual sense, he had little doubt that all those elite Starlords would've seen through his Void Concealment with incredible ease, especially since they would've had their Worldly Domains manifested at all times in such a chaotic battlefield.
It was one of the reasons he never used it. It was almost entirely nullified in effectiveness against powerful spiritual sense or Worldly Domains that grasped the entirety of a cultivator's reach.
BOOM!
A final thunderous boom resounded, and Wei Wuyin felt that the punishment was ready to descend. With a faint smile, he allowed it to naturally occur.
Ohn! Ohn! Ohn!
His Bloodline of Sin activated once again, covering his entire body with its uniquely dark-red colored symbols, including the strange circle with various runic markings and esoteric symbols that emanated a trace of sinful light at his glabella. The sinful eye that was both vertical and seemingly demonic had side-ways pupils that contained a hue of golden color at its center.
The lightning collapsed onto Wei Wuyin and inundated his body like a flash of golden light. The golden light transformed into its own set of symbols that enveloped his body. The entire experience to Wei Wuyin felt like a single word: tingly.
Karmic Luck Value: 43,053.0.
First Calamity: Survived - 7/7.
Second Calamity: Claimed - 1/1.
Third Calamity: Suppressed - 43 Years.
The entire tattoo, unlike it had done before, underwent a rapid change!
Karmic Luck Value: 44,052.4.
First Calamity: Survived - 7/7.
Second Calamity: Claimed - 1/1.
Third Calamity: Suppressed - 16 Years.
