Chapter 924(A) – Settling the Cycle of Karma
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The space within the Extreme Violet Ring was sizable and comfortable. When Lin Ming received the Lin Family Clan into his spatial ring, he had left the majority of the buildings intact. As Lin Ming saw these buildings, memories began to emerge within his mind.
Hidden Smoke Hall. Rain Flower Pavilion.
As Lin Ming looked at these places that once resembled the most noble and upper crust society of the family clan, he felt emotions swell within him. These were areas that only the young masters and ladies of the family clan could enter. They would ride on wooden sedans and enjoy the flowery scenery. They would be accompanied by groups of servants as well as having trays of fruits and exquisite desserts waiting for them at any time.
When Lin Ming was young, this represented the ultimate lifestyle in his mind. He had longed for this type of wealthy life, and thought that after he grew up and reached the peak of martial arts, he could also become such a top character. But now, none of this was what he pursued.
In the past, Lin Ming came to the Lin Mansion several times with his father to prepare for great feasts. His job was to debone meat. With his sharp boning knife in hand, he would slice vicious beasts into various parts, and watch as his father cooked them into a number of different dishes.
Besides that, he and the Lin Family didn’t have much exchanges.
In the blink of an eye, ten years had passed. To martial artists that lived for tens of thousands of years, ten years was an insignificant period of time. But as Lin Ming recalled the memories of his childhood, all of those scenes and recollections of the past seemed blurry and remote.
The Lin Family descendants all arranged themselves according to rank and seniority and stood behind Lin Wanshan. A respected mortal family like the Lin Family had strict rules and tedious customs. Now that they were greeting Lin Ming, they naturally couldn’t show poor etiquette.
As the Lin Family descendants looked at Lin Ming, their eyes were filled with both respect and unease. To a legendary character like Lin Ming, all of them had been influenced by him, but very few had ever seen or heard from him. In the past several years, the Lin Family’s status had grown several times over, and they had faintly become the Sky Fortune Kingdom’s number one family.
Lin Wanshan had been assigned the title of Duke Lin. The Lin Family’s properties and businesses were countless. They could be said to be at the zenith of their glory. Even the Sky Fortune Kingdom Emperor Yang Lin had to be respectful when seeing Lin Wanshan. Not only did Lin Wanshan not need to bow, but he was even offered a site. In private, Yang Lin also had to call Lin Wanshan ‘Uncle Lin’.
Such respect and courtesy was rarely honored ever since the founding of the Sky Fortune Kingdom. Lin Wanshan wasn’t an idiot to think that Yang Lin treated him with respect because he appreciated his talents. Rather, all of this was because of Lin Ming. Even Yang Lin becoming the Emperor was because of Lin Ming’s support.
The truth was that after Lin Ming left the Seven Profound Valleys, the Lin Family descendants had no idea what degree Lin Ming had reached. They only knew that he was extremely fierce. Even after Situ Yaoxi and the others came, they still had difficulty understanding the situation of the world; those people already completely surpassed their imaginations.
Some Lin Family juniors and even elders began to pay their respects to Lin Ming and bow. This wasn’t unusual. According to the customs of the Sky Fortune Kingdom, if an Empress were produced within the family clan, then when the empress returned to her home, there would be a grand festive celebration. Everyone in the family would bathe in incense and there would be great banquets for days, ceremonial worshipping of ancestors, and events all around. Even the Patriarch of the family would have to bow down on both knees, even if he were the Empress’s father.
Now Lin Ming’s status was countless times higher than a mere Empress of the Sky Fortune Kingdom. According to the customs of a mortal family, everyone had to bow to Lin Ming.
There were many Lin Family descendants. Merely among the servants there were over a thousand sharing the same surname. As Lin Ming gazed upon such a large family, he actually didn’t feel much of a sense of belonging.
In his mind, his true family were his parents, his sister, and Lin Xiaodong, Mu Qianyu and Qin Xingxuan. Everyone else could only be considered distant relatives.
“Everyone, there is no need for such ceremony. Uncle Lin, please rise, I cannot afford such courtesy. When I left home in the past to pursue the road of martial arts, I never imagined I would bring such great blessings and such great disasters to the Lin Family. After the beast tide ended, I haven’t set foot in Green Mulberry City. I didn’t think that you all would be drawn into my troubles.
“Nephew Lin, you can’t say that. As long as the family clan remains prosperous in the future, then let alone losing a hand, I wouldn’t even blink if I had to sacrifice my life.
Lin Wanshan honestly and earnestly said. To a traditional respected family, the prosperity of the family clan and the passing of the glory onto the next generation was the most important matter. Even a clansman’s life was expendable in the face of such an important matter.
Lin Ming’s eyes moved to Lin Wanshan’s left hand and he saw that his hand had already been cut off. Lin Ming sighed. In this calamity, many Lin Family descendants should have died. There were even many that had lost their feet or arms, and all of this was because of him. He took out some pill bottles from his spatial ring and said, “Here are some medicinal pills that can regenerate limbs. For all those who had their arms or legs cut off, please take these pills to restore them.”
Spirit medicines that could regenerate mortal limbs weren’t considered too precious. Lin Ming had put out many different types of medicines, but none of these medicines were suitable for high level martial artists. To a high level martial artist that had crossed Life Destruction, their body would reform into a spirit body. If their arm was cut down and an ordinary untempered arm was attached in place of the old, then that would become nothing but a burden to them. In a fight, once true essence flooded into that limb, it would simply explode when it became unable to withstand the amount of true essence.
Of course, to a mortal and their daily life, none of this was a problem.
As Lin Wanshan saw all of these spirit medicines, his heart was overjoyed. No one wished to be disabled for the rest of their lives. As the rest of the Lin Family descendants saw these spirit medicines, that tiny trace of resentment they held towards Lin Ming also vanished.
“And here are some other medicines. Although they are useless to me, if a mortal were to take them, they can prologue life and eliminate all diseases. They can live for over a hundred some years. As for the rest, it’s to help raise the martial artists. Allow the martial arts masters of the family to eat these and it’ll allow them to break through the body transformation realm, and help their cultivation increase by leaps and bounds. If a Houtian master were to eat these medicines, it can even help them break through to the Xiantian realm.
As Lin Ming spoke, he took out another massive pile of medicinal pills. All of these medicines pills had been obtained from the countless martial artists he had killed. These were only basic low level medicines, but to a small sect they were priceless treasures.
Just these dozens of medicinal pills that could allow a Houtian master to break into the Xiantian realm was enough to make a third-grade sect go crazy with jealousy. One can see this from just how much effort Qin Ziya had spent in order to obtain a Heaven Opening Pill.
“These, these are spirit pills that can allow a Houtian master to break into the Xiantian realm?” Lin Wanshan gulped with some difficulty. He had some experience and certainly knew how precious these types of miracle medicines were. They were truly precious! A single one of these pills was equivalent to a city!
Lin Ming had casually handed out several dozen of these pills. That was equal to several dozen cities worth of wealth. Lin Wanshan was unavoidably uneasy that such precious treasures were placed within the family clan.
Lin Ming saw through Lin Wanshan’s thoughts and said, “Rest assured, the sects that will be jealous of these pills are small sects; they won’t dare to move against the Lin Family. As for those sects that dare to move against the Lin Family, they won’t care about these low level medicines.”
Lin Ming waved his hand. These words caused all of the Lin Family descendants to fall into a incredulous daze. To casually hand over so many pills on the level of a Heaven Opening Pill and still call them low level medicines, Lin Ming’s boundary was simply unimaginable.
Lin Ming thought for a moment and then pulled out a set of puppets from his spatial ring. There were a total of 18 puppets, and each one resembled a cruel demon, grim and savage as if they were devils that had crawled up from hell.
These were the puppets left behind by Corpsemancer. He had used these puppets when he was still at a low stage of Life Destruction, but after he entered the Destiny Decree, these puppets weren’t too useful to him anymore. They remained as only part of his collection. Lin Ming originally didn’t have any use for them, but now they actually came in handy.
Lin Ming took out a jade slip and placed his soul mark on it. He poured some true essence into the jade slip and passed it to Lin Wanshan “Just for emergencies. I give these puppets to the Lin Family as protective guards. If the Lin Family suffers a disaster one day, they can use this jade slip to control the puppets and safely pass through that calamity. This jade slip can be given to the Patriarch of the Lin Family. It can be considered a keepsake of the Patriarch and passed down through generations.
As Lin Ming spoke, the Lin Family descendants stared at the puppets with curiosity and horror. Corpsemancer was a bloodthirsty individual that loved death and chaos. These puppets had mostly been crafted from the corpses of top masters, and their skin and bones were tempered by sacrifices. These 18 puppets had crossed through oceans of blood, and the killing intent they exuded was nearly thick enough to condense into reality. If a mortal looked at them for too long, their souls would be damaged.
“Don’t look at them,” Lin Ming calmly said. He sent out an energy wave that completely isolated the killing intent emanating from the puppets.
The mortal Lin Family descendants were all lost in a stupor until Lin Ming sealed off the puppets’ killing intent. Their consciousness slowly returned, and a cold sweat began to ooze off their bodies. If just looking at these inactive puppets could do this to them, then it was hard to imagine how powerful they would be once activated!
Lin Ming flicked his fingers and 18 gray balls of energy shot into the 18 puppets; this was the compressed Heavenly Demon Force Field. He said, “Any one of these 18 puppets can easily sweep away the Seven Profound Valleys. If the 18 of them join forces, their power will increase a hundred times over. It will be enough to protect the Lin Family and guarantee your safety.”
“Sweep, sweep away the Seven Profound Valleys? 18 join forces, their power will increase a hundred times over?”
Lin Wanshan’s eyes widened as he heard Lin Ming’s words. Although he knew Lin Ming had reached a boundary that none of them were able to comprehend, the Seven Profound Valleys was still a heaven-like existence to the mortals of the Sky Fortune Kingdom. Even the Emperor wasn’t able to defy them, and the Seven Profound Valleys could even remove the Emperor if they wished. If that wasn’t heaven, then what was?
And such a heaven could be easily swept away by a single puppet. The psychological impact to Lin Wanshan could be imagined!
Lin Ming said, “That’s right. But the true essence I left behind in this jade slip is only enough to activate these puppets two times. Once they have been activated two times and the true essence is exhausted, the force field I left within the puppets will swallow them up and reduce them to dust. This is also to prevent other sects from coveting these puppets and bringing trouble to the Lin Family.”
“Only two times…” As Lin Wanshan heard these words, he thought it was somewhat a pity. It was obvious that Lin Ming had the ability to activate these puppets many more times, but he simply didn’t want to do that. For him to destroy these puppets after they were used, proved that these puppets weren’t worth anything to Lin Ming.
Lin Ming continued, “Two times is the limit. This is to prevent the descendants of the family clan to use these puppets to wage war with the world, recklessly plundering other lands and committing evil.”
“For a large family clan to rely on external forces to establish itself, that will make the family clan’s foundation shaky and able to fall apart in a single night. Placing a limit of two times is so that the family clan will only use them in periods of great calamity. If the Lin Family wishes to develop, then they must rely on their own foundations. As for what possible calamities may come your way, that will likely only happen when the switching of dynasties occurs, and that is only something that happens every several hundred years. These 18 puppets will guarantee the Lin Family a thousand years of prosperity. That alone should be enough.”