Published at 26th of January 2026 7:37 am

Chapter 1804: Grand Dream Turtle (2)

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One after another, the guardians left Grand Dream City.

Some left to prepare for what was to come, and some left to have a small celebration with their fellow guardians. Since this was a liberation, their mood was quite good. Most of them were in a rush to go out and have a good meal before doing anything else. In the end, only Su Yu and the old turtle were left behind.

The old turtle sipped his tea in silence for a bit before saying, "Five gone. This is within expectations. You are free to handle the ones remaining if traitors emerge among them. But as for the five..."

Su Yu laughed and asked, "Do you not trust me?"

"No." The old turtle said, "It's not the issue of trust. I'm just worried. I'm worried that you will enlist them by force when the fighting gets difficult."

Su Yu thought about it and said, "I won't. Since a promise is given, I won't go back on it. If the situation is allowed to worsen to a state where I need to conscript five Eternals to war, we might as well accept our defeat decisively."

Su Yu continued, "Let's not worry about this. I believe more trust is needed between us. We should talk about the Death Realm instead."

Su Yu moved on to a different topic and asked, "Are you familiar with South Heavenly King, Senior?"

"Not really." The old turtle said, "The four heavenly kings are ancient. They hailed from the primordial past, not the ancient past. They only submitted to humanity after Human Emperor's conquest."

Su Yu nodded and asked, "Are there Masters of Laws in the Death Realm? I'm not talking about proper Masters of Laws. I know that there is only one dao in the Death Realm. I'm referring to experts as powerful as the ancient human kings.

"After all, some of the ancient human kings were able to reach the level of Masters of Laws just by pursuing the physical body dao. And the death spirit dao seems even more powerful than the physical body dao."

He was very curious. During the ancient past, there were a lot of human kings with the combat strength of Masters of Laws. How strong was someone like that? Well, someone like that was capable of facing dozens of Daofuses alone. But the current heavenly kings were only strong enough to handle five alone. Or at most, they could handle six.

Hundred Battle King was strong, but he was still a tad bit lacking compared to the ancient human kings. He could handle about a dozen alone. Then again, that calculation included some abnormally powerful Daofuses so he could really be as strong as the ancient human kings.

And all these people pursued the physical body dao. The physical body dao was weaker than the death spirit dao. In that case, were there such beings in the Death Realm as well?

The old turtle wasn't too proficient with the manipulation of daos, but he could answer this question. After thinking about it, he said, "I don't know the various daos well, but I can draw a conclusion from what you told me so far."

"What is the conclusion?"

"Celestial River of Death." The old turtle said, "There are too many slumbering death spirits in there. Too many of them are super experts. It's not that there aren't such experts. There are probably a lot of them in the river. They have occupied large stretches of the death spirit dao. As for the four heavenly kings, they were stuck because there was no space for them to grow. Just by dying, these super experts had occupied large stretches of the death spirit dao even without waking up from their slumber."

Understanding dawned on Su Yu as he said, "So you're saying that the death spirit dao is crammed full. The remaining space is shared between the four heavenly kings. In that case, there are probably some terrifying existences hidden in the river. From what I can see, the death spirit dao can probably produce double the number of experts at the level of ancient human kings pursuing the physical body dao."

The old turtle nodded and said, "Yes. But I noticed that no Master of Law has ever returned as death spirits. But there are probably quite a lot of Daofuses at the level of ancient marquises in the river. Or to be precise, the death spirit dao is too full to have the power to bring back the dead Masters of Laws."

Su Yu said, "I see. So those Masters of Laws were too strong to be brought back by a mere death spirit dao. No matter what, it is only one dao. But it is likely that these dead experts are still deep inside the Celestial River of Death, awaiting enough power to be awakened?"

The old turtle nodded, "Yes."

Su Yu found himself in agreement.

"Let us talk about the South Heavenly King."

The old turtle gave it some thought and said, "We have never interacted much. I only had a few meetings with him in the past. He had maintained a low profile since his conferment. His presence had been very helpful. After the collapse of the ancient past, the East Heavenly King and North Heavenly King wanted to charge into the world of the living.

"At the time, West Heavenly King still maintained his ambivalent status. Thus, South Heavenly King worked with me several times to suppress them and keep the peace. West Heavenly King only fully turned against humanity after the end of the ninth epoch."

The old turtle looked at Su Yu and said, "That was probably related to that woman. In the beginning, he only wanted to remain a local hegemon. He remained silent for many years before his betrayal."

Su Yu was left quite speechless as he said, "How did he allow himself to be seduced by that woman even as a dead man? He deserved to die a second time."

Su Yu couldn't help but wonder if West Heavenly King was a super pervert. Why was a dead guy still so lustful? He truly deserved his death.

The old turtle laughed and said, "It's not surprising. At his level, even a death spirit is capable of feeling emotions. Also...cough, cough, uhm...that South Heavenly King is a woman."

"..."

As Su Yu stared at the old turtle silently, the old turtle assumed the expression of a gossiping old man and said, "During South Heavenly King's conferment, she asked for that title herself. At the time, everyone knew that Culture King resided in the south. He was the South King of the Four Cardinal Human Kings.

"That was really not surprising. At that level, a death spirit is the same as a living being. Back then, Culture King had countless female admirers."

The old turtle sighed and continued, "Culture King was magnificent and exceptional. Even death spirits couldn't resist falling for him."

Su Yu nodded, "I see. He was capable of seducing both the living and the dead. So is that the reason South Heavenly King has remained a human ally until now? By the way, I heard that Culture King spent some time staying in the Death Realm back then. Did he seduce South Heavenly King during that time?"

The old turtle did not comment on that. How was he supposed to know?

Su Yu smiled and said, "How interesting. So that's Culture King's fangirl. No wonder she remains a steadfast ally of humanity even after so many years. Thanks to you, I can now place more trust in her."

The old turtle said, "Don't worry about her. If she wanted to, she could have betrayed humanity back when the three kings turned against humanity. Together, I wouldn't be a match for them. The chaos of the dead would have spilled into the world of the living long ago."

"Yeah."

Su Yu nodded in agreement. He did not have to worry too much about South Heavenly King anymore.

The old turtle said, "I understand that you intend to pacify the North Heavenly King next. I doubt things will be so simple."

"What do you mean?"

"North Heavenly King is the strongest of the four. And you can't take too many living beings with you. I advise you not to take that dog of Culture King down there with you. His life force is too strong. He might cause a disturbance on another visit. Some unimaginably powerful enemy might rise from the river in response."

The old turtle solemnly said, "It would be much better to rely on the dead and guardians like us. I suggest that you don't take any other living being with you. Just imagine provoking the awakening of three, five, or even ten marquises from the river. How are we supposed to deal with them? In fact, it's not even a good idea for Heavendoom and the other two to enter since they have removed their petrification.

"Meanwhile, North Heavenly King still has fourteen marquises under him. They are currently on the defensive, turtling in their domain..."

Su Yu glanced at the old turtle oddly. Turtling...it was odd to hear this term from a turtle. Noticing Su Yu's gaze, the old turtle glared at him. Why was this guy looking at him like that? That was a term the humans used to use to insult him!

The old turtle continued, "No matter what, his status as a heavenly king is acknowledged by the heavenly laws. Not even you have the authority to remove his power there. Thus, South Heavenly King won't be his match there. The ten marquises under South Heavenly King won't be able to match the fourteen marquises under him either. They can only rival those marquises with the help of Lanshan and the three marquises under her. But your side won't have the upper hand."

"And I can't even leave as I need to be on the standby to deal with any powerful expert that might rise from the river. If a marquis were to rush past a death tunnel, things would be very troublesome for both of us.

"In fact, I can already feel it. Some marquises have awakened. I believe you noticed it previously as well. They had merely stayed idle out of fear for Fat Ball."

Su Yu nodded. That was true.

"You also need to be wary of the newly awakened death spirits. They might decide to participate in your war against the North Heavenly King. If that were to happen, the difficulty of your job would increase dramatically."

Su Yu nodded again. He said, "Even including Heavendoom and the others, we still have twenty-seven guardians who are high-degree Eternals. Together, they should be able to handle three or four Daofuses, right?"

The old turtle nodded and said, "Yes. But such a strategy is too risky. A Daofuse can mistep many times and still survive. But one mistake and everything might be over for us. The moment they break through our encirclement and scatter away, these Daofuse death spirits will be much harder to kill. Also, assuming you use six guardians to handle one Daofuse. The death of even one guardian might result in more deaths on our side."

The balance was simply too fragile. Yes, they had enough strength to put up a fight. But it wasn't reliable enough.

Su Yu rubbed his chin. True. The arrival of more living beings might further provoke the Celestial River of Death. That would be truly troublesome. That was the source of their worry.

Without such a worry, they would have the ability to easily suppress the North Heavenly King. He only needed Great Qin King and Great Xia King on his side to freely kill his way through the North Heavenly Domain.

Su Yu thought about it and said, "Senior, why don't you come with me? We will have Great Qin King and Great Xia King watch over this place temporarily. If things worsen enough that death spirit marquises are attacking, having two living Daofuses go down the tunnel will be the last thing we need to worry about."

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