Chapter 627 The Most Powerful Force

While Yu Shan was wholeheartedly imparting the Dao of Immortality to Ji Qing, Li An was also doing something crucial to his future.The border town of the 71st War Zone had been reduced to ruins.Many professionals had already cleared the battlefield. There was no smell of blood, no life, only wreckage, telling of their suffering.A wisp of dust drifted in the air.The dead city was deserted, except for one person who walked slowly through it.Collapsed buildings, fallen power lines, and countless cracks in the ground. Following these cracks revealed deep craters, the marks of war machines.A faint aura of source energy lingered on the crisscrossing city ruins.The world was silent.Li An looked up. The sun was setting, its rays turning a deep crimson at the horizon, even the clouds in the sky reflecting a blood-red hue.On the desolate ruins, beneath a blood-red sky, Li An stood alone, as if in the wasteland of a post-apocalyptic world.The Immortal Ancestor had left him a talisman, inscribed with four words: "Shadow of the Past."He gently pressed the talisman onto the pile of rubble beneath him.The talisman glowed, as if the blood-red light of the sky were burning the edges of the paper.Li An heard the sizzling sound of burning and smelled the faint acrid odor.The talisman took effect.Light and shadow began to intertwine, weaving together a scene from the past.The war machines arrived."Mom, what is that?"The answer was a merciless laser beam.With a deafening roar, screams filled with terror echoed through the clouds."Ah!!!""Help, help, help me!!""Monster, ah, the school, the school, my daughter, my daughter!!""No! No!" Li An stared, his eyes bloodshot, at everything that had happened that night.Demon soldiers brutally slaughtered unarmed humans, blade by blade.War machines raised their hands, unleashing a beam of laser light that swept across, obliterating an entire city.Corpses littered the sky.Countless drops of blood splattered, forming a long river that reached Li An's feet.The helpless people screamed in anguish, their terrified expressions mirrored in Li An's eyes."Is anyone coming to save us?""Is anyone..." The cries for help were drowned out by the deafening roar of the destructive beams.The aftershocks of energy tore apart everyone caught in the blast."I don't want to die... I don't want to die!!"It was a voice filled with such despair, as if it came not from the throat, but from the heart.But no one answered them.Never.Seven minutes.The war machine destroyed everything here.Li An didn't blink once during those seven minutes.Perhaps from keeping his eyes open for too long, his eyes stung, and cloudy tears streamed down his face, dripping onto the ground."Drip." The replay of the past had finished.The world fell silent again. The echo of his falling tears was like a piercing sword, causing Li An's heart to ache.He had never felt such pain.He bowed his head, clutching his chest, and knelt before the ruins, tears streaming down his face, uttering powerless roars.Now he could see nothing clearly; the events of those few minutes replayed endlessly in his mind.Beautiful, carefree faces were torn apart by lasers.Shattered.Broken skin lay scattered on the ground, bones, eyeballs, torso… broken, or shattered, stained with blood, rolling across the ruins, finally crushed to dust by passing war machines.A day earlier, he had completed his seclusion, attaining the Lesser Sacred Body, and immediately contacted Liu Dahu to obtain the materials needed for the subsequent formulas.Liu Dahu told him that someone could help him with all of this; he was more powerful than himself, almost omnipotent.Not Zhuge Tianming, but an orphanage director.Stunningly, the orphanage this director managed was the very place where Xiao Zhantian had lived since childhood.He was a refined and dignified old man named Cao Xiaoli."Child, your abilities are already very close to those of a tyrant, but you still lack the most important power.""Not laws, not talent, and certainly not luck, not formulas.""This power is called—hatred.""There is no power more powerful than hatred in this world.""Go face what you don't want to face, and extract the power of hatred from it." Cao Xiaoli's voice was hoarse, almost like the murmur of death, the complete opposite of Mr. Tianming's gentle voice, like a terrifying villain manipulating everything in this world from a place unseen by the world."When you believe you truly possess the power of hatred, come find me."Li An hadn't gone yet.He walked through all the destroyed border cities, using the shadows of the past to witness the past disasters.He couldn't blame anyone.It was simply his own incompetence.Finally, Li An, burdened with pain, boarded the flying shuttle and headed towards the High Heaven Domain.The Eighteen War Zones didn't need to be defended.A war had rendered the Demon Realm unable to mobilize troops for a short time, and even the newly built military fortresses were demolished.Therefore, the war zones were safe. Late at night, Li An arrived at the Emperor's First Orphanage.The orphanage's name was quite imposing.The director had been waiting at the entrance for a long time, wearing round-framed glasses, his eyes behind the lenses unreadable."Director Cao.""Let's go." Cao Xiaoli led Li An into the orphanage.The moment he entered, his soul seemed to change. He immediately smiled broadly, greeting all the children with kindness and gentleness, displaying his tenderness and love.It was as if Director Cao was the kindest person in the world.Until he led Li An into the orphanage's basement.The iron door slammed shut.Director Cao's face reverted to its previous indifferent expression, as if all living beings were mere ants.Suddenly, a faint smell of blood reached Li An's nostrils, followed by a chorus of screams."Kill me! Kill me!!" Li An looked around. He was in a prison, the cells filled with humans who were missing limbs and had terrifying appearances.Li An couldn't help but swallow hard, because the prisoners' limbs were laid out in the cells opposite them. Not just limbs, but all sorts of organs... organs that could still live even without them, like kidneys, even half a heart, including reproductive organs, regardless of gender.This was purgatory."Are they prisoners?""They're enemies.""Is there a difference?""Criminals need to face the judgment of the law, enemies don't." Dean Cao didn't turn around, walking calmly ahead, his breathing and footsteps never wavering.Suddenly, Dean Cao opened a cell and pulled out an arm.The prisoner opposite roared, "I've told you everything I can say, nothing's hidden, nothing at all!!""Kill me, I don't want to live anymore, please kill me!!" Li An couldn't help but turn around.But Dean Cao seemed not to hear at all, and walked towards the deepest part of the cell with the severed arm, completely ignoring the sounds around him.