Star Boundary, Lingxiao Palace.
A streak of light shot in from beyond the borders, halting before the grand hall and solidifying into a robust figure whose aura fluctuated with the powerful cultivation of an Eighth-Order Open Heaven cultivator.
Even at Eighth-Order Open Heaven, Zhao Lun did not dare act too casually upon arriving here. This was Lingxiao Palace—the Sect of the Dao Lord.
He had visited Lingxiao Palace several times before, for it contained several Secret Realms the Dao Lord had left behind. Every disciple who hailed from the Void Dao Academy had trained in those Secret Realms, reaping bountiful rewards.
Back when he had still been at the Emperor Realm, he had already sensed the Dao Lord's formidable strength. The higher his own cultivation climbed, the more he came to appreciate just how unfathomable the old man truly was.
Having come from the Void Dao Academy, he possessed exceptional talent and aptitude, and he had mastered the Laws of Space. Over the years, he had earned considerable merit on the battlefield—leading his subordinates into battle to slaughter the enemy, and even pulling off the feat of seizing a general's head amid an army of ten thousand.
In the Xuanming Army, he had become something of a renowned figure. An Eighth-Order Open Heaven cultivator was a pillar of strength in any army, and moreover, he had been a direct promotion to the Seventh Order back in the day, with hopes of reaching the Ninth Order in the future.
A month ago, he had suddenly received a covert directive from the General Office, ordering him to proceed immediately to Lingxiao Palace in the Star Boundary.
Zhao Lun had no idea what had happened, but since the order came from the General Office, he naturally did not dare be negligent. He set aside his duties at once and rushed here as fast as he could.
In his heart, he harbored some vague guesses. If the directive came from the General Office and involved Lingxiao Palace, it likely had something to do with the Dao Lord.
In any case, the various theaters of war had basically wound down. Mopping up the remnants of the Ink Clan scattered forces was a slow, painstaking process, so missing out on that was of no consequence.
What could the Dao Lord want with him?
Zhao Lun felt a surge of excitement. He straightened his robes slightly and stepped inside.
Upon entering the hall, he immediately felt pairs of eyes turning toward him. Zhao Lun blinked in surprise, then chuckled as he realized he was not the only one who had received the General Office's summons.
"That's Senior Brother Zhao Lun."
"Senior Brother Zhao, over here!"
Someone called out to him.
Zhao Lun looked in that direction and indeed spotted several familiar faces. He nodded with a smile and made his way over.
A considerable number of people had gathered in the hall—sixty or seventy at least, clustered in small groups and chatting among themselves. Zhao Lun exchanged a few words with those fellow disciples he knew well before learning that everyone summoned this time hailed from the Void Dao Academy, and every last one of them had mastered the Laws of Space.
They were not the only ones present. A number of Phoenix Clan members were there as well. Unlike these warm and jovial fellow disciples from the Void Dao Academy, the Phoenix Clan members sat apart with an air of aloof elegance and detachment, looking rather out of place among the rest of them.
Most of them had crossed paths with the Phoenix Clan at one point or another, and those who hadn't had at least interacted with other Sacred Spirits. They knew the Sacred Spirits were universally proud, with the Phoenix Clan being the most conspicuously so, and they thought nothing of it.
The disciples from the Void Dao Academy actually spanned a wide range of ages. Because the flow of time within Yang Kai's Small World differed from the outside world—at his current Ninth-Order Open Heaven realm and his mastery of the Dao of Time, the differential had already reached a ratio of ten to one. In other words, ten years in the Small World amounted to only a single year outside.
Moreover, since Yang Kai had brought them out of the Academy in batches, the age gap between the oldest and youngest fellow disciples could reach tens of thousands of years. In an ordinary Sect, a gap of tens of thousands of years would represent dozens of generations in seniority. But the Void Dao Academy was no ordinary Sect.
And age didn't really matter. Their shared origin gave them a natural sense of kinship, so the disciples of the Void Dao Academy—whether they knew each other well or not—would always look out for one another.
To put it bluntly, if all the disciples Yang Kai's Void Dao Academy had produced were gathered together, their combined depth and strength would rival that of the major Cave Heavens and Blessed Lands. Every disciple who had earned the right to leave the Academy and advance to the Open Heaven realm was a dragon among men. The weakest among them had been a direct promotion to the Fifth Order, and those promoted directly to the Seventh Order were hardly uncommon. Now, after all these years, the lowest cultivation among these departed disciples stood at the Sixth Order, while those at the Seventh and Eighth Orders numbered in the thousands, scattered across the various Great Armies in service.
A group of warriors proficient in the Laws of Space gathered together—after the initial pleasantries, they naturally settled into a discussion of the Dao, sharing their perspectives on the Path of Space. Often, a casual remark from one would spark sudden enlightenment in another, yielding rich rewards. All manner of brilliant insights collided here, blossoming with radiant light.
The Path of Space was notoriously difficult to cultivate. Before Yang Kai, across the entire Three Thousand Worlds, those who could cultivate the Laws of Space and truly master them were exceedingly rare. Only the Phoenix Clan, blessed by nature, counted Space as their innate Great Dao and possessed an innate command of it.
But after Yang Kai, the disciples from the Academy had carried this Grand Dao to extraordinary new heights.
It was not just the Laws of Space. A growing number had now also mastered the Laws of Time, and whether one cultivated Space or Time, such individuals were rare and invaluable talents.
Time passed, and disciples continued to be summoned from the field. Gradually, the crowd swelled beyond a hundred.