Chapter 806 Humanity Will Be Free
The other Nightfiend cultivators sensed it as well. One after another, they looked toward the sky.
A young man hovered above the abyss with his hands clasped behind his back. Flames danced within his right eye, lending him an uncanny appearance.
“That... That isn’t one of us. He’s human!”
“Quick! Notify the Patriarch!”
Several Nightfiends immediately took out their Voidlink Mirrors.
Before they could activate them, sharp whistles tore through the air.
Six or seven high-ranking Nightfiend cultivators appeared before Kael. Every one of them had reached the Planetary Realm, and their leader was a Planetary Tier 6 expert.
“How could a human possibly cultivate to your level?” The leader studied Kael for a moment before realizing something. “No—you aren’t one of this galaxy’s humans. Where did you come from?”
As he spoke, another Nightfiend behind him hurriedly took out an Astral Compass, apparently intending to contact the race’s true leaders.
The lower-ranking Nightfiends in the mine relaxed.
Once their Patriarch and the other experts arrived, this human would soon join the miners laboring in the abyss below.
“You dared treat humanity this way.” Kael’s voice rolled across the mine, reaching every corner of the vast complex. “Today, your race will learn a lesson.”
“Bold words. Do you realize that the Nightfiend Race also has Galactic Realm cultivators?”
The Planetary Realm Nightfiend assumed that Kael was, at most, a Planetary Tier 9 cultivator.
Every race in the galaxy was bound by an ironclad law: humanity could not be permitted to produce cultivators above the Planetary Realm.
“Is that so?” Kael asked calmly. “Where is this Galactic Realm cultivator? Summon him immediately.”
The Nightfiend Galaxy was far smaller than the Sunlance, Northguard, or Celestial Maiden Galaxies. As a result, the strongest Nightfiend in the entire galaxy had reached only Galactic Tier 8.
The farther a race stood from the top of the universal rankings, the more viciously it tended to abuse humanity.
Such races were powerless against higher-ranked civilizations and frequently suffered humiliation at their hands. Unable to retaliate against those stronger than themselves, they vented their anger on the weaker human race instead.
That was why humanity’s enslavement in the Nightfiend Galaxy was especially brutal.
Humans weren’t even given the opportunity to produce Core Formation cultivators. Most of those born with Spirit Roots were still treated as mortals and forced to mine stellar ore or perform other grueling labor that permanently damaged their cultivation foundations.
“Then wait here,” the leader said.
He exchanged a look with the elders beside him. They immediately surrounded Kael, though none dared attack first.
Kael remained where he was, his hands still clasped behind his back as he quietly waited for a true expert to arrive.
Below, one of the Nightfiends brought his whip down hard across a miner’s back.
“Stop using this as an excuse to rest. Keep moving the stellar ore out of the mine!”
The moment he finished speaking, his body convulsed.
Boom!
The Nightfiend exploded, scattering flesh and bone in every direction.
“You!” The Planetary Tier 6 Nightfiend glared at Kael. “Didn’t you say you would wait for our Patriarch?”
“Say one more useless word, and you’ll share his fate.”
“I...”
The Nightfiend immediately fell silent. He lowered his head, though his gaze continued darting restlessly from side to side.
Time passed.
A day later, Kael turned toward the teleportation array.
A low hum sounded, and a figure appeared before him.
This was the Nightfiend Patriarch, the supreme ruler of the Nightfiend Galaxy.
“What? A human in the Eternal Realm?”
As a late-stage Galactic Realm cultivator, the Nightfiend Patriarch recognized Kael’s true cultivation at a glance.
“Good. That saves me the trouble of explaining.” Kael spoke with absolute authority. “From this moment onward, every human in the Nightfiend Galaxy is to be freed. Carry out my order properly, and I may reward you. Fail, and the Nightfiend Race will cease to exist.”
Since breaking through to the Eternal Realm, Kael had become far more forceful.
He intended to repay every humiliation humanity had suffered.
“I—”
The Nightfiend Patriarch managed only a single word before Kael cut him off.
“Choose your next words carefully. Your answer will determine the fate of the entire Nightfiend Race—whether its name survives in this universe or disappears forever.”
The Nightfiend Patriarch pressed his lips together and looked down at the countless members of his race gathered below.
The lower-ranking Nightfiends stared back at him expectantly.
They couldn’t perceive Kael’s cultivation. As far as they were concerned, their Patriarch should simply kill this arrogant human on the spot.
“You demand that we free them, and you expect us to obey? Who do you think—”
Before the Planetary Realm Nightfiend could finish, his body began swelling like an overfilled bladder.
“Aaargh!”
He managed only a single scream before his body burst apart, reducing him to a cloud of blood.
Several drops splattered across the Nightfiend Patriarch’s face.
“Pass down my command,” the Patriarch said without hesitation.
“Every human in the Nightfiend Galaxy is to be freed. On every planet, they are to receive land rich in spiritual energy where they may cultivate. From this day forward, no race in this galaxy may enslave humans or harvest them for blood.”
The remaining Planetary Realm Nightfiends trembled in terror. They hurriedly took out their Voidlink Mirrors and Astral Compasses, contacting their people on other planets and ordering them not to harm humanity.
Kael had problems of his own.
Nearly one trillion humans already lived inside his Inner Cosmos. If he tried to take away the humans on this planet as well, the Inner Cosmos might be pushed beyond its limits.
Besides, even if he rescued the humans here, there were at least ten thousand inhabited worlds across the Nightfiend Galaxy where humans remained enslaved.
How could he possibly rescue them all by himself?
His only option was to make an example here and force the Nightfiend Patriarch to treat humanity properly.
“Here. Take this Blood Dragon Pill.”
Kael handed the Nightfiend Patriarch a pill.
“You’re giving me a Blood Dragon Pill?”
The Patriarch stared at it in confusion.
“Treat humanity properly from now on. When I return, I may reward you far more generously. But if I discover that you merely pretended to obey and continued these practices behind my back, the Nightfiend Race will no longer have any reason to exist.”
The final words carried a chilling weight.
“I would not dare disobey.”
The Nightfiend Patriarch bowed slightly.
“Good. I’ll be leaving now.”
“Allow me to escort you.”
The Patriarch flew to Kael’s side.
“Very well.”
The two of them flew toward the teleportation array.
“If I am not mistaken, you must be the renowned Kael Lin,” the Nightfiend Patriarch said.
Kael wasn’t surprised. His name had spread throughout several nearby galaxies long ago.
“That’s right.”
“Then everything makes sense. However, I heard that a powerful member of the Machine Race imprisoned you within his Inner Cosmos many years ago. Has humanity reached some sort of agreement with the Machine Race?”
“That isn’t something you need to know.”
Kael gave him a meaningful look, leaving the Patriarch to draw his own conclusions. He then crossed the remaining distance in several rapid flashes and landed at the center of the teleportation array.
The Nightfiend Patriarch personally granted him access.
The array hummed as brilliant white light rose around Kael.
A moment later, he disappeared.
Kael emerged several light-years away.
The cultivators guarding the destination array were startled by his sudden arrival and regarded him warily.
Kael strode out of the array without the slightest concern, rose into the air, and soon flew beyond the planet’s atmosphere.
From space, he gazed into the distance.
A dense nebula stretched across the darkness, its shape resembling a graceful maiden caught in the midst of a dance.