Chapter 423

Chapter 423: If You Really Miss Your Mother
On the right side of the starship there was an area made of some unknown material. From the outside, it looked no different from anything else, but from inside one could clearly see the scenery outside.

Because of this, Yu Zhao could look through that area to enjoy the view.

The starship flew higher and higher. After passing through the thick layers of clouds, it gradually entered the starry sky.

Looking down, the Water Realm slowly turned into a pale blue sphere.

Back when Yu Zhao had comprehended the Path of Reincarnation, she had already learned that the stars she used to see were actually one planet after another.

The Cultivation World she had been in before was also a sphere.

But at that time she had been an insubstantial soul. Even though she personally experienced it, there had always been a lack of solid, down-to-earth reality.

Now, as she watched the Water Realm grow smaller and smaller, a surge of heroic passion rose in her heart.

[One day, I will roam freely through the starry sky without relying on a starship! All worlds will be beneath my feet!]

“Well? Beautiful, right? You have never seen it before, have you?”

Yu Zhao’s boundless fantasies about the future were suddenly shattered by an irritating voice.

She pulled out a not-very-genuine smile and did not answer.

Huo Shao Yan, however, started chattering beside her, showing off: “I rode a starship when I was seven. It was even bigger than the one Tu Xiao bought. It could hold over a hundred people inside. The first time my mother rode it, she even…”

His voice gradually trailed off until it was almost inaudible.

Yu Zhao glanced sideways. Beneath his faintly trembling eyelashes was a pair of shattered eyes, touched with a thin mist, as if tears would fall in the next instant.

“Young Heir Huo…”

“I am fine.” Huo Shao Yan sniffed. “I just miss my mother.”

He looked at Yu Zhao pitifully and said: “My mother used to dote on me the most. Her greatest regret was not being able to see me marry and have children.”

Huo Shao Yan liked to wear bright red and dressed extravagantly every day. Now, with a pair of wet eyes wide open, he gave off a strange sense of contrast.

Someone with a delicate heart would probably not be able to help feeling pity for him.

Unfortunately, Yu Zhao was not such a person.

If Huo Shao Yan could enter this gamble, how could he not know what kind of place the Auspicious Palace was?

He knew better than anyone why his and Shui Qiu Bai’s mother had died.

Yet in the end he had still become the Young Heir of the Huo Clan.

That also meant he had made a choice between his mother and power.

Just like now. For the sake of this gamble, he could use his mother to win Yu Zhao’s sympathy without any burden.

The outer shell could be dressed up, but the soul inside could never be covered up.

“I am sorry for bringing up something that makes you sad. If you really miss your mother, I… I…”

Yu Zhao put on a look of guilt and sympathy. Under Huo Shao Yan’s sorrowful yet slightly expectant gaze, she bit her lip.

“…I can be your godmother!”

“Pff!”

“Pff!”

“Pff!”

Feng Jiu Si, Tu Xiao, and Shui Qiu Bai all spat out in unison.

Huo Shao Yan was dumbfounded.

He stared blankly for over ten breaths before finally coming back to himself. His face turned green and white as he pointed at Yu Zhao and roared: “You little… mmph mmph!!!”

He had just gotten two words out when Shui Qiu Bai covered his mouth from behind.

Yu Zhao flailed in panic: “Did I say something wrong?”

Shui Qiu Bai’s expression was very strange.

He studied Yu Zhao carefully.

He could not quite tell whether she had done it on purpose or not.

Yu Zhao calmly accepted his scrutiny, her small face slightly red. Her embarrassed expression did not look fake.

The doubt in Shui Qiu Bai’s eyes faded a little. Holding Huo Shao Yan by the neck so he could not struggle, he said to Yu Zhao, brief and to the point: “It is not your fault. I will take him below to cool him off.”

The gamble had only just begun. Shui Qiu Bai did not want Huo Shao Yan to ruin it ahead of time.

He forcibly dragged Huo Shao Yan down below, while Feng Jiu Si and Tu Xiao walked over, stifling their laughter, to comfort Yu Zhao.

Yu Zhao took the chance to speak less and played the part of a quiet listener at the side.

Perhaps because the journey was long, or perhaps because they wanted to show off their strength in front of Yu Zhao, Feng Jiu Si and the others grew talkative. They discussed many things that ordinary cultivators would never come into contact with.

For example, the Southern Region was further divided into seven camps according to different powers. The Fire Realm and several Small Worlds attached to the Fire Realm formed one faction.

The seven camps did not see eye to eye with one another and would break out into conflict from time to time. Each conflict would see casualties numbering in the tens of thousands.

Moreover, from what Feng Jiu Si and the others said, the neighboring Outsider Faction had been very restless lately.

It might not be long before the two sides clashed head-on.

Aside from that, they also mentioned a special organization called the Daqian Alliance.

As the name suggested, the Daqian Alliance was an alliance formed by cultivators from the Great World. Their goal was to select outstanding talents from the Middle World and send them to the Great World.

To ascend from a Lesser Thousand World to a Middle World, a cultivator’s cultivation level had to reach the maximum limit that the Lesser Thousand World could bear. Only then could the teleportation channel be triggered.

The process from a Middle World to the Great World was not much different.

The existence of the Daqian Alliance was to shorten that time and allow geniuses to gain the best cultivation resources more quickly.

There were at least a hundred Middle Worlds of all sizes, but the Daqian Alliance had only thirteen members. They considered themselves superior and naturally could not go to every world in person to select talents.

Thus, the Selection Trials came into being.

At first, selections were held every fifty years, then later only once every hundred years.

And there were still thirty-eight years until the next selection.

From the tone of Feng Jiu Si and the others, it was obvious that they were all planning to take part in the next Selection Trials.

Alarm bells instantly rang in Yu Zhao’s heart.

[Those thirty-eight years are not only the countdown to the Selection Trials, but also the countdown to my death.]

If Feng Jiu Si and the others wanted to stand out in the Selection Trials, they would inevitably use all kinds of methods.

A cauldron was definitely one of them.

Even if she had not reached Divine Transformation by then, they would certainly not leave her any more time to grow.

So before the Selection Trials, she absolutely had to find a way to break away from them.

One day later.

Yu Zhao, as usual, sat to the side listening to the four of them chat.

Just then, the four of them all stood up at the same time.

Their expressions were solemn.

Yu Zhao did not ask what had happened, but turned her head to look toward the transparent section.

Outside was a deep, vast starry sky. Gorgeous nebulae dotted the dark backdrop like a bizarre painting, beautiful yet unfathomable.

Yu Zhao could not see anything unusual from the calm starry sky, so she withdrew her gaze and watched the four men instead.

Clearly their senses were much keener. After a brief moment of dazedness, their expressions immediately changed.

“Turn back! Turn back!”

Tu Xiao shouted as he sent the order to the starship, completely losing the bearing of a Young Heir.

The other three also looked anxious, with an indescribable fear in their eyes.

Seeing this, Yu Zhao’s heart thudded.

She had been in the Southern Region for three months and had picked up some common knowledge.

The existence that could make the four of them so frightened, and that appeared in the starry sky, seemed to have only one possible answer.

That was the supreme overlord of the starry sky – the Starry Sky Behemoth!