The Great Genetic Era

Blue Star had to cultivate a Small Universe expert.

Xu Tui had considered this long ago, and he had discussed it with Principal Cai and An Xiaoxue many times.

In importance, it was like Blue Star’s earliest nuclear weapons, yet not quite the same.

It was not only about deterrence.

It could be said that Blue Star now looked thriving, its strength soaring.

With Blue Star’s current power, an all-out assault by any one of the three alien races could be withstood.

Even a joint assault by all three races could be fought with real force, and Blue Star could even concentrate its power to heavily wound one of the fronts.

But there was a fatal weak point.

If any one of the three supreme experts of the three alien races—whether Hei Yang, Chuling, or Yuan—paid any price to break into the solar system,

Blue Star would have no chance of facing them head-on.

They would either have to flee, or fill the gap with the lives of Nine Satellites Planetary-level experts, with the lives of Nine Satellites elites.

And that number would not be in the single digits, but in the tens.

At least a dozen or so, at most several dozen.

And that would only consume the enemy’s strength and force a temporary retreat. Killing them would still be impossible.

But if Blue Star had a Small Universe Realm expert, everything would be different.

Even the weakest Small Universe expert, under layer upon layer of power amplification, with the advantage of fighting on home ground and the many guardians of the solar system, would not be wiped out by Hei Yang and the others in a single blow.

They could always hold out for a few exchanges.

As long as they could hold, there would be a chance.

In game terms, Blue Star’s Nine Satellites Planetary-levels were the kind with high attack, thick health, and even critical hits.

As long as one Small Universe expert pinned down one of the three invading alien supremes head-on, Blue Star’s other Nine Satellites Planetary-levels—including Xu Tui, Cai Shaochu, Ullr, Wen Xinglun, and the rest—would have a chance to assist from the side.

Even if they could not kill the enemy, they could still inflict heavy wounds.

That would spare Blue Star catastrophic casualties.

Without such a Small Universe expert, if even one supreme of the three alien races came over, one misstep and Blue Star’s strength would be rolled back overnight to square one.

This was what Xu Tui thought about most now, and what he worried about most.

He had to prepare early.

The mental-body clone secret art he had arranged before had, aside from freeing Shang Long, also been meant with this in mind.

But after Xu Tui obtained from Qiao An the details of how Small Universe experts broke through, and from the remnant soul of Heavenly Emperor Gou Chen various information from the Ancient Heavenly Court remnant slips, and after discussing it with Cai Shaochu, Shang Long, and the others, the path to cultivating a Small Universe expert gradually became clear.

Regarding Small Universe experts, there was one major premise—founding a school and becoming its ancestor was extremely hard!

What did it mean to found a school and become its ancestor?

It meant being a pioneer who opened up a line of supernatural power.

The classic example among them was Cai Shaochu.

Cai Shaochu’s character-formula type of supernatural power had, in fact, drawn inspiration from Huaxia’s ancient talismanic seal script; its root even lay in ancient seal characters.

Many of Huaxia’s ancient seal characters came from heaven, earth, and all living things, and within them lay the power of the Dao.

Cai Shaochu had skipped past talismanic seals, created character formulas outright, then directly comprehended the related rule power and broken through to Nine Satellites.

But the premise of breaking through to Small Universe was to thoroughly master one rule power of a supernatural force, then resonate and fuse with it.

That required not only comprehending that one rule power to the extreme, but also being extremely complete—not missing even a sliver.

Comprehending it to the extreme was fine.

The hard part was completeness.

If there were predecessors’ experience, if there were elders’ experience to fill in the gaps, completeness was easy.

But for a pioneer, it was different.

According to the records in the Ancient Heavenly Court remnant slips, in ancient times there had been many pioneers who never broke through to Small Universe in their entire lives.

The related rule power had long since been cultivated to the extreme; they were only missing the edges and corners.

But those edges and corners could lock down their path of breakthrough completely.

It was like reaching 99.9% similarity, yet still falling short by 0.1%, and still being unable to break through.

That was where the difficulty of breaking through to Small Universe lay.

For cultivators guided by predecessors, the difficulty on this point was somewhat lower.

For pioneers, that difficulty multiplied.

Seen this way, if Cai Shaochu wanted to break through to Small Universe in the future, it would be extremely, extremely hard.

Even if a breakthrough were possible, it would still need a vast amount of time as a foundation, worn down slowly.

Three to five years was absolutely impossible.

Within thirty to fifty years, the odds were vanishingly small.

Of course, there was also the chance of sudden enlightenment and breaking through overnight.

But that probability would be no greater than that of Mars colliding with Earth.

Under those circumstances, several people had to be ruled out.

Cai Shaochu was the first. Xu Tui’s own main star of mental power was the same; in the short term, there was no possibility of that kind.

Zhao Hailong and Luo Murong had no such chance either.

As for An Xiaoxue, there was no need to even think about it.

An Xiaoxue was still stuck at the peak of Eight Satellites.

And according to the known information, those who broke through to Small Universe most easily were those guided by predecessors, and those who cultivated the most common powers.

But the problem was that Blue Star had no predecessors.

The most common powers were earth, water, wind, fire, thunder, and the like.

But Blue Star’s problem remained the same: still no predecessors.

Blue Star did not even know, among the origin branches of those related supernatural rule powers, which branches were already occupied and which were vacant.

On that point, compared with the three alien races, they lagged far behind.

Fortunately, Xu Tui had earlier obtained the Ancient Heavenly Court remnant slips from the remnant soul of Heavenly Emperor Gou Chen.

Within them, matters concerning Small Universe experts had also been recorded in considerable detail.

In the Ancient Heavenly Court, the existence of the Six Imperials represented mastery over six major categories of power rules.

Of course, it was not neatly divided; there was mixing among them.

For example, the thunder-type power rules that governed slaughter were partly controlled by the Nanji Changsheng Great Emperor, partly by the Beiji Zhongtian Ziwei Great Emperor, and partly by the Jade Emperor.

It was the same for fire-type and wood-type.

No single power was left entirely under the control of one Heavenly Emperor.

That was a balance unique to the Huaxia divine race.

Judging from that, with the Six Imperials all currently missing, there ought to be quite a few rule-power origins left vacant and unoccupied.

But in this world, the known Small Universe experts already numbered four: Hei Yang, Chuling, Yuan, and the Earthly Venerable.

And those were only the known ones.

Xu Tui felt that aside from the Muya race, the Spiritual Race and the Great Xi Clan ought to have Small Universe experts who had not yet shown themselves.

In that case, it was hard to say which origin branches of supernatural rule power were still without a master. With no Small Universe expert of its own, Blue Star could not observe that either.

That only added difficulty to cultivating a Small Universe expert for Blue Star.

Originally, the more common fire, earth, water, and thunder supernatural powers all had quite a few practitioners, but because of this, they could no longer judge which to choose.

Fortunately, Xu Tui discovered another piece of information in the Ancient Heavenly Court remnant slips.

It concerned the function of the Four Origin Small Universes.

The remnant slips said that one function of the Four Origin Small Universes was to suppress their respective origin rule powers.

That suppression was inward-facing.

The gist was that the Ancient Heavenly Court, through the Four Origin Small Universes, had locked in advance some of the main supernatural rule origin powers among the four origin forces of earth, water, wind, and fire.

Or rather, it had left a certain mark.

Under those circumstances, only with the Ancient Heavenly Court’s permission, and only after a cultivator’s cultivation reached the required level, could they resonate and fuse with the related supernatural rule origin power and break through to Small Universe.

Without the Ancient Heavenly Court’s permission, even if cultivation was sufficient,

they would never be able to resonate and fuse with the related supernatural rule origin powers locked by the Four Origin Small Universes.

That was one method by which the Huaxia divine race, through the Ancient Heavenly Court, had kept its own power advantage.

But there was also a premise—the Four Origin Small Universes had to be held in hand.

Only by gaining control of the Four Origin Small Universes could one use the Emperor Seals by special means to let cultivators resonate and fuse with the related rule origin powers, in hope of breaking through to Small Universe.

The present situation was that among the Four Origin Small Universes, only the Fire Origin Universe had been unsealed and brought under control.

The other three—earth, water, and wind—did not even have known whereabouts, let alone being unsealed and brought under control.

That gave Blue Star its direction for cultivating a Small Universe expert.

Fire-type supernatural power.

Blue Star held the Fire Origin Universe, and Xu Tui held two Emperor Seals. In theory, he could grant authority and help someone break through.

The candidates for breakthrough thus became clear.

At present, three people led in fire-type Nine Satellites supernatural attainment: Erera, Ruan Tianzuo, and Qu Qingshan.

Their attainment in fire-type rule power followed the same ranking.

In the end, Ruan Tianzuo was removed from the cultivation candidates.

It was not that Xu Tui or Cai Shaochu were petty and holding a grudge. It was that Ruan Tianzuo’s private ambitions ran too deep.

These past years he had followed on campaigns and earned no small number of merits, but a nature heavy with selfishness was hard to change.

It was foreseeable that if Blue Star’s Small Universe experts were truly cultivated successfully, then for years or even more than a decade their numbers would still not be many—one or two, three at most.

If Ruan Tianzuo were raised up, and then returned to his old ways with no one to restrain him, that would not be good for Blue Star. It would be an internal disaster.

Erera and Qu Qingshan.

Those were the preliminary cultivation targets.

As for whether they could break through, and who could break through, that was hard to say.

So when Shang Long finished cultivating the mental-body clone art, successfully separated out his main body, and left the clone to suppress the New Moon, Xu Tui took Erera into the Small Universe first.

Qu Qingshan was currently leading troops in battle. Xu Tui first took Erera into the Fire Origin Universe to explore a little.

As for the solar system, with Cai Shaochu and Shang Long’s main body holding the fort, Xu Tui’s departure was not a big problem.

On the day of August 12th, Erera excitedly took her leave of Shang Long.

In the half year and more that Shang Long had merged himself with the New Moon, Erera had been gloomy and listless. On expeditions she had only acted like a tool—moving when Xu Tui ordered her, staying still when he did not.

This time, with Shang Long’s main body out again, seeing him anew left Erera wildly excited, her whole person radiant once more.

She also found drive again for cultivation and breakthrough.

“When I break through and come back, I’ll avenge you, Long!”

In front of his disciples and grand-disciples, receiving Erera’s fervent hug left Shang Long a little awkward. But after being trapped in the New Moon so long, he had thought a great deal, and he no longer resisted.

In the next instant, Xu Tui opened a temporary passage to the Fire Origin Universe through the crimson Fire Slip, took Erera with him, and stepped inside.