Negotiating With an Immortal

The Lunar Song Tribe's Third Immortal King did not say much in response to Yaan's impudent suggestion.

"Fine." He said, standing up and leaving before even finishing his tea.

He came here to negotiate with the Red Demon, but in the end, the Red Demon directly suggested the exact solution that the four immortals of the Lunar Song Tribe had decided to pursue.

As the immortal walked out from the temple, he spoke without pausing or looking back.

"Do not attack our main tribe, branch tribes, or direct vassal tribes. Do not expand your province to encompass more than 10% of the kingdom's lands. Our tribe will overlook your actions, so long as you do not cross our bottom line."

With that, the muscle-bound immortal left. The moment he stepped outside of the door, he simply disappeared.

Yaan had been watching him from beginning to end. Seeing him vanish like that, he narrowed his eyes.

In the past, he had never been able to see how the immortals were able to vanish suddenly and without a trace. But just now…

He saw it.

Even without activating reveal truth, he was able to see the immortal's movement, albeit only just. He did not teleport or anything of the sort. It was just that his basic movement speed was shocking, it was easily one hundred times faster than any Peak 5-Star warrior!

6-Star warriors were often called 'half-step immortals', but Yaan saw this as a joke. The Nirvana realm was like dipping your toes into the pool of immortality, but true immortals had dived into the pool and were swimming freely within the majestic waters.

After the immortal left, Yaan contemplated silently for some time.

This result was exactly what he wanted to see, but he was not surprised that it turned out this way. It was the most logical course of action for both parties.

The Lunar Song Tribe would sit back and wait, banking on Yaan failing his immortal ascension. Once he died, the Bloody Totem Tribe would no longer be a problem for them.

Yaan was banking on his own success. He knew that his chances of succeeding were extremely slim, but when had something like that ever dissuaded him?

The Lunar Song Tribe's Third Immortal King came away from this situation with a complex feeling in his heart.

Frankly, he did not know how to deal with this 'mortal'…

Mortal…

In his subconscious mind, though, he no longer thought of Yaan as a mere mortal.

Mortals did not threaten immortals. Mortals did not negotiate with immortals. Mortals did not show a fearless demeanour when being pressured by immortals!

He clearly had Rank 4 cultivation…

But he did not have the mindset of a common mortal.

The old immortal guessed that the reason for this mortal's unbelievable calmness when dealing with immortals, could only be caused by one of two things.

Firstly, he had a powerful backer. It was entirely possible that this 'Red Demon', who seemingly appeared from nowhere, was the disciple or descendent of a powerful immortal, who had been sent out into the world to temper himself through the difficulties of living off his own efforts.

The other possibility, was that he was actually a reincarnated immortal.

A reincarnated immortal with their memories intact from their past life…someone like this, if they were a formidable person in their past life, could indeed display this sort of demeanour.

But reincarnation was a dubious matter, especially so on the Blood Plane.

Yaan first learned of reincarnation from Rui. She had mentioned it in passing, informing him that it was possible for immortals to reincarnate back into the physical world with their memories in tact.

But it wasn't quite so simple.

The Spirit Plane Lord had vaguely mentioned some of the details regarding reincarnation, but she seemed hesitant to go into detail.

On the Qi Plane, if the body died but the soul survived, leaving the body and entering the world without being tethered down to any physical entity, it would phase through the plane boundary, entering the Spirit Plane.

As for what happened to the soul once it entered the Spirit Plane…

Many of the souls were taken by the Divine Court, which had established the world's most prominent cycle of reincarnation across the four planes!

The Spirit Plane Lord allowed the Divine Court to occupy a certain area within the Spirit Plane, letting them manage their cycle of reincarnation.

The Spirit Plane Lord was the absolute ruler of the Spirit Plane, so the fact that she allowed her enemy, the Divine Court, to exist and operate within her world plane, was quite strange.

Yaan did not fully understand this matter, but he could more or less work it out based on other things she had mentioned.

The Divine Court put in all the effort and resources to deal with the endless influx of souls from the Qi Plane. Those souls which had potential to become righteous path cultivators in their next life were reincarnated back into the Qi Plane!

Mortal souls from the Qi Plane with any sort of potential were included in this group. Mortal souls would lose their memories during the passage through world planes, but their Qi refining cultivation talent would remain once they were reincarnated.

Origin Souls belonging to Origin Soul realm Qi masters were also reincarnated into the Qi Plane. These people also lost their memories, but they retained their cultivation talent from their past life, and their dao comprehension would be very quickly re-established until they reached their former level of understanding. They also tended to experience fewer difficulties when breaking through each realm.

Their mind would forget, but their dao soul would not.

As for Qi refining immortals, they also possessed origin souls, but they were able to retain their memories during their reincarnation. Sometimes they would retain a portion of their memories, sometimes they would retain everything. If they managed to once again become an immortal, they would fully recall all of the old memories from their past immortal life.

But the Divine Court did not control the reincarnation of all souls…

The Spirit Plane Lord kept many of the souls for herself.

Some souls were simply ignored by the Divine Court, being released into the Spirit Plane without any further consideration.

The souls of demonic path members, including demonic race members, were almost always destroyed by the Divine Court; the only exception was if those souls were to be handed over to the Spirit Plane Lord for her requirements.

It should be noted that in this cycle of reincarnation, the Blood Plane was not even considered.

The Divine Court released all of its souls back into the Qi Plane.

As for souls separated from the body on the Blood Plane…

They did not cross over to the Spirit Plane, whether they were mortal souls or primal souls. Yaan did not know what happened to those souls that lost their host body on the Blood Plane. Maybe they just died.

As for body tempering immortals, they did not even possess a soul separate from their physical body!

When a body temperer entered nirvana, their primal soul became half-fused to their body. After overcoming Nirvana Rebirth, the soul was fully fused into the body, massively strengthening the body with the power of the integrated primal soul!

For this reason, it was almost impossible for body temperers to reincarnate in the manner that Qi refiners sometimes did.

As such, the Lunar Song Tribe's Third Immortal King thought it much more likely that Yaan had a powerful background, and that his ability to remain calm in the face of an immortal stemmed from this.

Even so, it was still quite unbelievable that he was actually able to resist an immortal's killing intent without so much as a change in his expression!

Yaan's existence concerned the Lunar Song Tribe Immortals, but what could they do?

Perhaps, they could stealthily assassinate him, hoping that nobody would notice?

It was impossible. The war flower law was absolute, and there was a reason for it being so strictly enforced. Yaan did not know this reason, but he had naturally realised that there was something restricting the immortals from acting against the war flower law secretly.

If they could, wouldn't they just ignore the war flower law, killing him without anyone noticing?

But they could not!

This was due to the War Flower Empire's scrolls…

On the surface, these scrolls seemed to be mere pieces of parchment, but they were far more than that.

There were countless minor scrolls. A minor scroll was required to establish and sustain a tribe. Without a minor scroll, you would be labelled a renegade group, guilty of breaking the war flower law if the group grew too large, too organised, claiming their own land and developing their own strength!

The minor scrolls had no special effect other than being impossible to damage in any way, but the major scrolls were different.

There were 5,000 major scrolls, one for each kingdom. In order to form a kingdom, a tribe must possess a major scroll. If their major scroll was taken, they lost the qualification to rule the kingdom, and the new owner of the scroll could take the kingdom for themselves!

Of course, others could then attack the new owner of the major scroll, repeating the vicious battle for supremacy.

But the major scrolls were very special. Major scrolls needed to be kept by the one true ruler of the kingdom. This ruler, in order to truly own the scroll, needed to bind it. In order to bind the scroll, they were required to swear a dao oath!

Unless you wanted your dao soul to shatter, you could not break a dao oath. As such, the ruling immortals that owned the major scrolls were completely unable to go against the rules laid out on the major scrolls.

In essence, if Yaan was secretly killed by the Lunar Song Tribe's Third Immortal King, the First Immortal King would be forced to properly investigate this matter. Once he discovered the truth, he would be forced to kill his own immortal brother, this was decreed by their very own war flower law major scroll!

As such, immortals did not dare to go against the war flower laws as dictated by the major scrolls.

Yaan did not know the specifics, but he could work out that they were restricted by the war flower law in some unforeseen way. He took advantage of this fact, relying on the war flower law to protect himself.

He had killed.

He had negotiated.

And now, finally, he had attained peace.

Yaan took a deep breath, and cleared everything from his mind.

"Ga Shu." He called out softly. His voice was not loud, but it somehow echoed out through the surroundings, reaching Ga Shu's ears outside of the formation.

Only Ga Shu heard his words. He and his wife both entered the formation, but only Ga Shu entered the temple.

Seeing that Yaan looked unharmed and calm, if a bit bloodthirsty, Ga Shu breathed out a sigh of relief. He was glad to see that his lord's condition was stable and did not seem to be growing worse.

"Please instruct me, my lord." He bowed slightly and said.

"I am going to enter secluded cultivation…" Yaan began. Ga Shu nodded, but Yaan added:

"For a very long period of time. Potentially many decades, or perhaps even longer. I want you to guard me properly in this time, but also ensure that that the Bloody Totem Tribe Leader is handling things properly. I want her to reach the Peak 5-Star realm, and I want her to gain absolute control over the province. Do not wage war, but also do not back down to any enemies. When I emerge from my cultivation, I expect my province to be in a prosperous, stable state, ready for immediately engaging in a large scale conquest."

Ga Shu nodded seriously. He understood that Yaan was going to attempt to overcome a difficult bottleneck. As for which realm he was attempting to reach, Ga Shu really had no idea.

He had long since given up on trying to discern Yaan's actual cultivation level. He just came to the realisation that Lord Red simply could not be judged by common sense, it was pointless trying to guess his motives.

"Of course, my lord. I will do my utmost to ensure that your cultivation is not disturbed."