Hour of Goat (01:00 PM - 02:00 PM)
It had only been a few hours after Aksai completed Humeyin’s treatment.
At this hour, he was busy discussing a few important matters with Humeyin inside his palace when his Aether Clone suddenly sent him an urgent warning.
Aksai abruptly rose from his seat, his expression turning grim.
His clone had informed him that his Fortune was plummeting at an alarming rate. If his Fortune were represented on a graph, the line would have resembled the stock price of a Fortune 500 company crashing straight into the ground after its CEO suddenly died.
It was as though an extremely dangerous, life-threatening situation was rapidly approaching—one in which confronting it head-on would leave him with almost no chance of survival.
Aksai’s own Fortune-telling Arts weren’t profound enough to make such a judgment. His Aether Clone, however, had made remarkable use of his druidic abilities to advance his understanding of Fortune-related techniques by leaps and bounds.
And the price for that rapid progress had been Aksai’s own recoverable lifespan.
Aksai’s Aether Clone couldn’t exactly be called a complete druid. However, he and Aksai shared the same origin. As such, the clone could treat Aksai’s lifespan as its own and spend it to fuel his advancement in the Fortune-telling Arts.
At this point, Aksai’s Aether Clone was even more proficient in certain Fortune-related techniques than Naisha despite her being a Core Formation Lord.
One had to note that Naisha had already practised the Fortune-telling Arts and made quite a progress in the technique long before she met Aksai. And yet, Aksai had left her behind.
This was only natural.
Naisha could cultivate her Fortune-telling Arts only with the lifespan available to her. She could only make use of limited techniques mentioned in the arts.
Aksai’s Aether Clone, on the other hand, could spend Aksai’s recoverable lifespan almost as recklessly as he pleased. He used his main body’s recoverable lifespan as an infinite money glitch to gain massive amounts of experience in the Fortune Telling Arts.
To a druid, Fortune Telling Arts was no different from a game that came preloaded with cheats specially for him.
So when his Aether Clone warned him about the incoming danger, Aksai took the warning seriously.
He immediately checked his Fortune Flame using his Third Eye, AKA the Astral Eye, which had appeared vertically between his eyebrows.
The result shocked him.
His Fortune Flame was normally colorless because of his status as a Fate Anomaly.
But now, it had turned pitch black.
Worse, the blackness was still deepening, as though his Fortune was continuing to deteriorate right before his eyes.
Aksai immediately understood.
The forces of the Shinayin Empire were approaching Emerald Cove Island.
And they were coming directly for him.
’These fuc*king imperials. It seems they finally decided to wake up.’
Although this was happening much earlier than he had predicted, Aksai didn’t panic.
Even though it was out of his expectations, a part of him still expected the unexpected to happen. The imperial cultivators had many tricks up their sleeves that he couldn’t even begin to imagine and there was nothing he could have done to prevent this confrontation.
Even if he weren’t on the island, the imperial cultivators had their own means of finding him and dealing with him before he could reach the Duya Forest.
After all, the entire region was already in chaos, making it even more difficult for Spirit cultivators to cross the Shiju River safely. That too without the imperials’ notice.
And even if he managed to enter the Duya Forest without encountering the imperial cultivators by using the hidden route mapped by the Blackblood Sect and given to him by Selene Bloodmist, that still wouldn’t guarantee his safety.
The imperial cultivators could reach him before he made it to the Shinayin Empire.
New land and aerial routes connecting the empire to the Orveth Subcontinent were already being established.
Of course, establishing such routes was anything but easy, considering the demon beasts lurking within the Duya Forest.
Even a peak-level Lord from the empire could turn into beast poop if he happened to be targeted by a group of powerful demon beasts.
Forget about the Lord-level existences, even the Nascent Soul Kings would have to keep their attitude in check while nearing the periphery of the Eternal Beast Dynasty.
Aksai would be at an even greater disadvantage if he had to fight the imperial cultivators under such circumstances.
Compared to those possibilities, facing them here, on his own territory, where he had the home-ground advantage, was far more favorable.
At least, that was what he wanted to believe.
And logically speaking, it wasn’t entirely wrong.
There was another reason he couldn’t simply leave.
The array formations in the underground cave had taken him decades and countless precious resources to establish. Without them, it would have been impossible for him to help Humeyin break free from her bloodline shackles.
The entire procedure had to be performed inside that underground chamber. It was the only place capable of allowing Aksai to carry out the treatment while keeping the danger to Humeyin at a minimum.
The third reason was much simpler than the first two.
Emerald Cove Island had become his home.
It was the place where he had grown from a nobody into a Lord-level existence and made a name for himself across the subcontinent. Because of that, Aksai still had many lingering attachments to the island.
He was a pragmatic man. He knew he had to leave his home eventually.
If not today, then tomorrow.
After all, his actions against the imperial cultivators had already made staying in Emerald Cove increasingly dangerous.
Yet there was still a rebellious part of him that wanted to fight this losing battle.
Not because he believed he could win.
He simply didn’t want to have any regrets when the time finally came to abandon his home.
It was unlike his usual cold and calculating self.
But at the same time, it was also a part of him. Especially when running away from the Emerald Cove Island at the first sight of danger made him feel disheartened.
This was when Aksai had openly criticised the Purple River Lord for being too sentimental regarding his attachments to his sect.
A part that still hesitated to sever his roots and walk away.
One could say that it was easy to judge and lecture others. But when faced with the same situation, the one who judged would start to relate with those who had gone through it earlier.
Aksai thought about all of this for a brief moment.
Then he slowly took a deep breath.
His eyes gradually hardened as his decision became clear.
He was going all in.
If the imperial cultivators wanted to come for him, then he would make them pay for stepping onto his territory.
Aksai decided to interfere with his Fortune Flame one more time, even if doing so meant burning through a significant portion of his own lifespan.
Aksai communicated with his Aether Clone through their shared consciousness and instructed it to boost his Fortune once again, using all the Fortune he had accumulated from laundering the Fortune Flames of the imperial cultivators.
That’s right.
Before killing Varesh, Neshara, Droven, and Saelyr, Aksai had made sure to plunder their Fortune Flames. He had even managed to plunder the Fortune Flame of the Sun Ocean Lord before the latter was killed by his imperial pursuers.
Earlier, before arriving at Emerald Cove Island, Aksai had already used the Fortune he plundered from Kalina to strengthen his own Fortune.
That boost had seemingly been enough to arrange his encounter with the Sun Ocean Lord and the imperial cultivators.
Kalina’s Fortune Flame had been powerful enough to influence fate to such an extent. However, compared to the Fortune Flame Aksai had obtained from Varesh alone, all the other Fortune Flames combined couldn’t even hold a candle to it.
The reason was simple.
Varesh possessed a Yellow-colored Fortune Flame. It was his first time witnessing such a fortune flame.
It was two entire levels higher than Kalina’s.
This was what Aksai privately referred to as Main Character Luck.
It was obvious that Varesh wasn’t supposed to die at Aksai’s hands. Someone with such extraordinary Fortune was destined to accomplish great things in the future. With his original fortune, he might have found a way to return to the Eternal Sea and make a name for himself there as well.
Unfortunately for him, he had crossed paths with Aksai—a person known as a Fate Anomaly.
Under normal circumstances, using Varesh’s Yellow-colored Fortune Flame to boost one’s own Fortune would have been more than enough to produce a massive increase.
In fact, using anything beyond Varesh’s Fortune would almost be considered overkill.
But Aksai wasn’t taking any chances.
Since he had already accumulated the Fortune Flames of the other dead imperial cultivators and the Sun Ocean Lord, he decided to use all of them at once.
If he was going to interfere with his Fortune at the cost of his lifespan, he might as well make the most of the opportunity.