The Mirage

The mirage was a mysterious phenomenon with a long history in the East Sea. It was said that the Mirage Clan had once been incomparably powerful, ranked among the East Sea's ten great races, and their most famous divine ability was the mirage. Eight thousand years ago, the Mirage Clan's Old Ancestor ran into trouble while comprehending a spell and suffered qi deviation. This caused the mirage to spin out of control, swallowing up the clan's core members. Ever since, the Mirage Clan fell from their standing among the ten great races, while the runaway mirage drifted aimlessly across the East Sea, engulfing living beings without distinction—whether human or Sea Race. Some beings managed to walk back out of the mirage, either emerging completely unharmed or raving mad and incoherent. Still others vanished inside it, never to appear again. According to the recollections of those who made it out safely, they had encountered the missing people inside the mirage; however, those people were under the illusions' control and were intensely aggressive. Once, several Tribulation Transcendence stage Demon Emperors joined forces in an attempt to disperse the mirage, only to encounter the deranged Old Ancestor of the Mirage Clan. The Old Ancestor fought a ferocious battle against them and perished of exhaustion, yet even after his death, the mirage still did not dissipate. From that point on, no one ever tried to confront the mirage again, treating it instead as a roaming natural disaster to flee from the moment it appeared. *** "What? The life tablet can't sense Xinghai's location?!" Clan Head Xiao, who was currently recovering from his injuries, discovered that Xiao Xinghai's life tablet had gone dim for no apparent reason. This did not signify death, but rather that he had moved beyond the life tablet's sensing range. "Moving beyond the life tablet's sensing range means they entered a secret realm of extraordinarily high caliber? No, as much as Xinghai likes to fool around, he wouldn't dare take guests into a secret realm without saying a word! "Could they have been swept into some place... Damn it, it's the mirage!" Clan Head Xiao quickly realized. *** "Well now, Clan Head Xiao, what brings you to our doorstep with free time on your hands today?" Hearing that Clan Head Xiao had arrived, the Mirage Clan Head hurried out to welcome him in his true form. Clan Head Xiao had no patience to mince words with him. Glaring icily at the Mirage Clan Head with his emerald eyes, he jabbed his hooked beak right against the clan head's forehead. "Let me tell you, my son and our clan's esteemed guests are trapped inside that mirage you people created! If even one of them comes to harm, prepare for retribution!" The Mirage Clan Head turned pale with fright. "Tell me, how exactly does one escape the mirage?!" Clan Head Xiao was preparing to enter the mirage on a search-and-rescue mission. Before coming to the Mirage Clan, he had already dispatched men to locate the drifting mist near his territory, which confirmed his suspicion. The Mirage Clan Head looked on the verge of tears. "Clan Head Xiao, that's not a mirage at all! If it were, our clan wouldn't be completely helpless!" "Not a mirage?" "That's right! Eight thousand years ago, the Old Ancestor found a mysterious space. He said that if he could comprehend its secrets, he might become a half-immortal. To that end, he laid down layer upon layer of formations and entered secluded cultivation. "Later, no one knows what the Old Ancestor did, but the mysterious space erupted and turned into a mass of mist. Those formations didn't do a single thing. The Old Ancestor's seclusion ground was at the very core of our clan's territory, so when the mysterious space erupted, it swallowed up more than half of our core members." Clan Head Xiao's expression grew increasingly grim. *** "What do we do now?" Trapped inside the mirage, Lu Yang and his companions didn't dare make a move. They tried using their divine sense to probe their surroundings, only to find it could barely advance an inch here. Even Su Yiren, at the Body Integration stage, was no exception. Only Man Gu had known little about the matter, unaware of how terrifying the mirage was, but after Xiao Xinghai gave a brief explanation, he was spooked as well. "According to the memories of those who made it out safely, whether staying put or wandering aimlessly, both can lead to escape!" Xiao Xinghai recalled the information. When he said "made it out safely," he meant people who had not lost their sanity. "So we can get out no matter what we do?" Man Gu asked. "It's not that simple. Those who went crazy or vanished into the mirage probably did the same thing. Whether we get out safely comes down to luck. "If we're lucky, nothing happens, and the mirage moves away from us. If our luck is worse, we'll get attacked by people previously trapped here, but we might still get out after holding out for a while—according to the records, more than one Body Integration stage expert is trapped in here. If our luck is even worse, we'll either be killed or driven mad by the illusions." "Fairy, do you have any solution for this?" The mirage was notorious across the East Sea. Lu Yang knew this was not a situation he could handle on his own; he needed to call for help. Having transformed into a mermaid, the Immortal Fairy was lying upon the sea fast asleep when Lu Yang reluctantly woke her up. "What is it... *yawn*... What happened?" "We're trapped in a mirage." "A mirage? That divine ability of the Mirage Clan... *yawn*... Isn't that something you can disperse with a single breath?" "Wait a second. This isn't a mirage. How could the Mirage Clan ever have the ability to produce something like this?" The Immortal Fairy knew full well what the Mirage Clan was capable of. "Then what is it?" The Immortal Fairy frowned, speaking with gravity. "Ruins of an immortal war! Both combatants were immortals. This place is full of traces left behind by an immortal war and Dao fruits!" "Tell me, why did you say this was a mirage just now?" Lu Yang recounted the legends regarding the mirage. "A mirage created by a Tribulation Transcendence stage cultivator of the Mirage Clan... That's definitely bogus. "More likely, that Tribulation Transcendence cultivator sensed traces of an immortal war here and tried to comprehend a rudimentary Dao fruit through them. But through a slip-up, he lost control, causing the residual might of these immortal war ruins to erupt and swallow him as well." "Then who fought here?" The Immortal Fairy carefully sensed the ruins of the immortal war. "I can feel that one of the combatants was Immortal Kirin. Immortal Kirin's Law of the Jungle Dao fruit is suited to every member of the demon race—it's demon nature itself. Perhaps that Tribulation Transcendence cultivator from the Mirage Clan vaguely sensed it too! "Yet this doesn't add up. In my memory, after Immortal Kirin became an immortal, he never went through a battle like this!" Lu Yang grew tense as well, sensing that something was amiss. "Was it the battle between the Four Ancient Celestials and the mastermind behind the scenes after you fell, Fairy?" The Immortal Fairy shook her head. "Probably not. This battle wasn't that exaggerated, but it was definitely no sparring match—they were fighting to kill." Lu Yang pondered. How could this be? The enemy of the Four Ancient Celestials should only have been the mastermind behind the scenes; who else could Immortal Kirin have fought? Wait, it seemed there really was someone. "Fairy, do you remember? After you fell, the Xinhuo Dynasty emerged, and an immortal was suspected to have been born during that era who was deliberately erasing the dynasty's existence. "Could Immortal Kirin's opponent be the immortal born during the era of the Xinhuo Dynasty?" "An immortal born during the Xinhuo Dynasty? That truly is possible."