pjbooks Chapter 122 Declaration of War
Chapter 122 Declaration of War
When the black ice flowers fell on the long street outside the main gate of Qingyun Academy, the entire street was already empty.
The people who had registered were evacuated to underground shelters the moment the alarm sounded. Folding chairs, thermos cups, and recruitment brochures left behind by the roadside quickly turned into puddles of viscous black liquid under the corrosive effect of the ice flowers. A pungent, acrid smell filled the air, mixed with the bluish smoke rising from the corroded branches of locust trees in the nearby flowerbeds.
A golden light shield steadily enveloped the entire Qingyun Academy. The illusory sword intent of the Primordial Sword slowly rotated in the center of the shield, each rotation creating a layer of pale golden ripples on its surface. Ice flowers falling on the ripples were like falling on a red-hot iron plate, evaporating completely before they could even make a sound.
Then, the ice flowers stopped.
It didn't stop gradually; it all stopped at the same instant. The falling black ice crystals seemed to have been paused by an invisible hand, suspended in mid-air, completely still. The air surrounding the light shield began to distort.
A figure emerged from the crack.
He appeared to be around thirty years old, tall and slender, dressed in a plain black robe with a silver belt around his waist. His short, neat black hair lay flat against his scalp, and a vertical, old scar ran from his hairline to his brow. His features were deep and sharp, but what drew the most attention were his eyes—amber pupils that gleamed with a warm yet cold light under the golden aura.
First Apostle, Kahn.
He stood outside the light barrier, his hands behind his back, as relaxed as if he were strolling in his own backyard. His gaze passed through the golden light barrier, sweeping over the Qingyun Academy flag on the factory wall, which had a hole etched into it by ice flowers, over Wang Kai and Shen Qingxue who were still in fighting stances in the courtyard, over the students being urgently transferred at the entrance of the training ground on the first basement floor, and finally landed on the window of the dilapidated dispatch room on the second floor of the factory—Jiang Chen's daily office room, with a half-finished cup of cold coffee on the windowsill.
Kahn's lips curled up slightly. The curve was so faint it was almost imperceptible, but it was definitely moving—a smile that a hunter reveals only after confirming his prey is strong enough, a smile suppressed for countless years.
He didn't make a move. He just stood outside the light barrier, hands behind his back, as if waiting for someone he had arranged to meet.
When Jiang Chen's Primordial Sword landed outside the main gate of Qingyun Academy, Kahn had been waiting for a full thirty breaths. The sword light dissipated, and Jiang Chen stepped down from the blade, the hem of his school uniform still fluttering slightly from the rapid flight. He gripped the Primordial Sword in his right hand, the tip pointing diagonally to the ground, golden light swirling along the blade. His expression was calm, but in his eyes, as deep as a thousand-year-old pool, Kahn's smiling face was reflected, and a very subtle fluctuation flickered deep within his pupils.
"First Apostle." Jiang Chen spoke first, his voice not loud, but it pierced through the frozen silence of the ice flowers and the hum of the golden light barrier, clearly reaching the ears of everyone present, "Your landing coordinates are chosen at the main gate of my academy. You're not here to fight."
He paused for a moment, his gaze sweeping over the old scar on Kahn's forehead before settling back into those amber eyes.
"You don't need to use your brain when you fight. The fact that you brought your brain means you're here to deliver a message."
Kahn tilted his head slightly, his amber pupils reflecting Jiang Chen's seventeen-year-old face. He stared for a long time, as if confirming something, before speaking. His voice was completely different from what Jiang Chen had expected—not deep, not suppressed, not hurried, each word precise as if measured with a ruler, but without any haughty arrogance, only a calmness that had settled over countless years, a calmness bordering on sincerity.
"Three hundred years ago, I placed the seed of awakened power into a black ice flower and scattered it across the human continent. Three hundred years later, humanity produced a swordsman capable of killing two of my colleagues. I've come personally to confirm the final result of this experiment." He glanced sideways at the academy behind Jiang Chen, protected by a golden light shield, his gaze lingering for a moment on the tattered academy flag on the factory wall before returning to Jiang Chen. "You're younger than I imagined."
"You're more polite than I expected."
"I am usually very polite to people who are about to die."
When Kahn said these words, his tone remained unchanged.
"I have only one question. Was this global descent your order, or a unanimous decision by the entire apostle realm?"
"It was my order," Kahn didn't deny it, "but I didn't force them. The six Apostle Temples activated simultaneously, gathering the power of the entire Void Origin, and teleported the Ice Flower Storm through folded space to every major city on this planet. Apart from your academy, your Jiangzhou, and the western border of your Dragon Kingdom—nowhere else are there cultivators. No Immortal Emperors."
He released his hands from behind his back, letting them hang at his sides, his amber pupils staring directly into Jiang Chen's eyes. His gaze was as frank as a mirror, unwavering, unblinking, and without any concealment.
He paused for a moment, as if letting Jiang Chen process the data, and then took a step forward.
"Jiang Chen, I have lived for tens of thousands of years. On the day the Apostle descended, I thought I would have to watch ants carrying food for hundreds more years. But you came. You have the power to slay gods, you have a civilization that transcends dimensions, and most importantly—you have a weakness. You have something you want to protect. So I came to declare war on you."
A fierce yet extremely restrained light ignited in his amber pupils—the first time in tens of thousands of years that his fighting spirit had boiled over for a human being.
"This battle is not a war between the Apostle Realm and humanity. It is a war between me, Kahn, and you, Jiang Chen. I don't care about deaths, injuries, victory, or the survival of the other ten Apostle Halls. I only care about one question—does the Immortal Emperor have a limit? If so, I will find it. If not, I will die by your sword."
In the void, the dark golden rift slowly widened behind him. The scene at the other end of the rift could be vaguely seen—a desolate wasteland, in the center of which stood a completely black Apostle Temple, the First Apostle Temple. Kahn stood at the entrance to the void and glanced back at Jiang Chen.
"Three months. I will activate all the Apostle Halls, and the Ice Flower Storm will strike a new city every three days. Human Awakened Ones can participate in the defense, and your cultivators can also go to the battlefield—this is the war training of your own human civilization, and I will not take this opportunity away. Three months later, I will be waiting for you on the hundredth floor of the First Apostle Hall. Three months, is that enough time for you to build this academy?"
Jiang Chen remained silent for a long time. Then he smiled and nodded gently.
Kahn smiled too. His smile was identical to Jiang Chen's—the smile of a hunter finally finding prey worthy of his fight, the smile of someone who had lived for tens of thousands of years, thinking their life would end there, only to be struck by an unexpected event, the smile of someone who had shattered the void and was immortal yet, for the first time, hoped someone would kill them—a smile only those who had stood at the pinnacle of their species for far too long could understand. Before turning and stepping into the rift, he said, "Three months. I'll wait for you."
The crack closed, and the ice flowers fell again. The black snow curtain poured down from the sky once more, but it was thinner than before—as if the rhythm of the attack had been switched from "all-out assault" to "warning." Jiang Chen turned around and looked at the Qingyun Academy flag behind him, which had been eroded with a hole. The pale gold sword pattern on the flag still hung intact, gleaming faintly but firmly in the black snow curtain.