Paragon of Sin

The No-Name Galaxy had gathered their elites of various generations within the Land of Manu by a galactic-wide, far-reaching announcement. The great Sages of the Major Regions, those fairly independent, such as Sage Shattered Sphinx and Sage River Oasis, and the various territorial leaders of the other Major and Minor Regions of the galaxy, had done so to discuss the great tragedy that had recently plagued their galaxy!

The Theft of a Million Stars!

The title of this incident was already being added to the historical records, detailing the sinister act of a villain who betrayed the Sages' trust after entering their world, plotting to steal their greatest treasures, and robbing a million star fields across the galaxy!

While the actual number of stars present in the galaxy far exceeded that number, and only smaller forces were exempt from losing their near-lifetime of gathered resources, the vast majority of the forces had been directly robbed and lost everything in their guarded vaults!

It was far more insane than a simple title could ever satisfy!

Teng Jiangwen had already earned himself a legendary title and story that would persist for millions of years as a great, ancient tale!

The Land of Manu would be the setting, and this was a blessed opportunity for the galaxy's greatest forces, greatly incentivizing the participation of so many leaders and juniors. It was clear that the Sages intended to open this blessed land that was originally sealed off, shrouded by myth, to strengthen their galaxy after experiencing calamity and uplift the hearts, including to showcase a form of unprecedented unity.

While the actual contents of the discussion were rather ambiguous, this opportunity had to be seized. Fortunately, the revelation of eight divinely chosen had exposed the legends as true. The Land of Manu held the secrets of a Sage's path!

For those strictly in the know, they understood that the Eight Sages—Sage Khepri, Sage Khonshu, Sage Nepit, Sage Shattered Sphinx, Sage Pakhet, Sage Amunet, Sage Hathor, and Sage Imentet—had once had a fortuitous encounter within the Land of Manu while Sage Nepri was Dao Companions with Sage Nepit and Sage River Oasis was the love-child from a powerful, galaxy-traveling foreigner of the Utmost Purity Galaxy with one of the top, widely-recognized, and world-shocking beauty of their galaxy.

With eight others chosen by the great Land of Manu's eight doors, receiving that Sage's path opportunity, despite the devastating losses, the various leaders had hope for the resurgence of a stronger galaxy. However, that was in the far-reaching future. The consequences of their current calamitous state had yet to be solved!

-----

"WHAT IN THE GREAT HEAVENS DO YOU MEAN?!"

A voice laced with power and anger boomed within a room, directed at a central platform.

The Main Hall of the Land of Manu designed for this great, once-in-a-lifetime convocation of the elites of the elites, the geniuses among geniuses, was an extremely large, open area that was surrounded by seating arrangements, and at the very center was a square platform atop a raised cylindrical stage and a podium that was rotatable and could rise and fall at will. While the various attendants were seated or standing in pulsating, circular platforms that could fly at will, reorganizing themselves if needed or standing out if they sought to take the stage.

The entire main hall resembled the internal structure of a spherical three-quarters dome with the platforms littering the walls, observing the central platform from every angle.

At the center stage, upon the platform podium, standing upon one of the many platforms, but with a coloring of gold and silver, unlike the standard, unassuming black and silver of the other platforms, Sage Khonshu stood solemnly with an upright posture.

The one who had just shouted angrily without restraint was a Mystic Overlord of great prestige. Normally, as a Sage, he would never allow himself to be shouted at so disrespectfully, but the rules of this meeting had already been established just prior, and anyone could voice their questions and concerns by activating a spiritual amplification formation within their platforms.

Moreover, it was already agreed that besides direct conflict, voicing one's opinion will not affect one's life or endanger one's faction. This was an open forum for discussion even if Sage Khonshu had previously stated that this was more of a formality, the fact remained that this entire event was rare and allowed the voices of others to resonate and reach the ears of others.

For example, like this Mystic Overlord!

Sage Khonshu had just informed them that the treasures of their entire galaxy, the entirety of hundreds of thousands, and to some, as old as millions of years, of accumulated resources, had been eviscerated in Teng Jiangwen's suicidal, vindicative actions of self-detonation.

This was met with hushed whispers or raging shouts of disbelief.

Even those at the Mystic Overlord level had assumed that the Sages had dealt with the issue, dealing with the thief, and were summoning everyone to discuss how to return the resources, while taking a portion as a 'fee' for their sacrifice and the respective forces' inability to protect their gains. That was fine in many of their hearts, albeit with some harsh feelings, but the actual announcement was a direct statement of a complete and total loss of EVERYTHING!

EVERY!!

THING!!

EVERYTHING!!!

"That's utterly impossible!"

A faction leader of a Minor Region exclaimed through the platform's formation after seeing the Mystic Overlord take the lead in questioning such an outrageous result.

"Are the Sages trying to claim all the resources for themselves?!"

A brave, indignant Original Magistrate mustered up his courage to follow through and question, inducing a wave of shouts and roars of unwillingness to accept such an outcome.

Sage Khonshu and the others were fully aware that this would be the outcome of this announcement, and the reactions might be even more chaotic if they left it to fester and the others to gather and discuss, exaggerating with false ideas, and could induce a potential civil war. They were Sages, but their strengths were not absolute!

The Mystic Overlord who had initially shouted might not have a cultivation base to fight against a Sage on equal terms, but he possessed a strong geographical and astonishingly cohesive army with tactics that could rival the strength of a Sage, including in possession of a lineage-type Heavenly Treasure that was passed down from generation to generation, constantly refined by successive leaders of his organization, and that granted him great strength.

There were only eight Sages!

And Sage Shattered Sphinx and Sage River Oasis would definitely not participate. Moreover, Sage Nepri was severely injured, Sage Pakhet and Sage Imentet suffered injuries as well, and the rest had exhausted a great portion of their Mystic Power, which required an extraordinary amount of time to recover through cultivation. They simply could not afford such an event!

The meeting was designed to reveal the devastating news while being able to direct the narrative with a proper explanation without causing a galactic civil war. There were layers to this discussion!

Sage Khonshu didn't exert any of his terrifying Spiritual Aura to settle the crowd, and only slowly speaking, naturally blotting out the formations as the central platform, a benefit of being at the center.

"I understand all of your thoughts. Unfortunately, your thoughts and concerns are shared by the Sages of the Eight Regions as well."

"Shared?! Utter bullshit! The Sages weren't robbed! WE WERE!!"

A Mystic Overlord shouted. It belonged to an older woman who appeared to be in her sixties, her eyes listened with the vicissitudes of age, but her boiling fury and passionate heart were unaffected by her long life. She spoke her mind without issue. Despite not being in the center platform, just exerted spiritual strength that blasted through the formation, faintly exceeding the central platform. This was also a benefit of having an extraordinary cultivation base.

After her statement, a raging uproar of shouts occurred as curses and insults were flung out. Many still believed that the Sages were attempting to scam them. After all, the concept of so many resources of so many organizations and forces simply being eviscerated was unbelievable to begin with. Not even the Sages believed it until Sage Amunet only discovered complete annihilation from her divinations. Furthermore, each of the Sages conducted their own investigations and divinations to verify that result, not even trusting Sage Amunet fully!

"..."

Sage Khonshu's expression darkened considerably. The Mystic Overlords of the galaxy were taking the Sage unapologetically and leading the charge.

Whoosh!

A black and silver platform shot out of the crowd, arriving beside the gold and silver platform Sage Khonshu was on. The newly arrived platform slowly transformed into gold and silver as well, a sign of being linked to the main spiritual formation.

"Enough!"

Sage Pakhet shouted with tremendous force that swept across the Main Hall like a wild gale. Even the Mystic Overlords went silent. She was renowned for her ferocity, and she had very little patience.

Sage Khonshu softly sighed. He could only silently shake his head within his heart.

Sage Pakhet spun, eyeing each platform surrounding her, and then said calmly:

"Your respective forces weren't the only ones robbed. We, the Sages of the Eight Regions, had also been targeted and lost no less, if not, significantly more than every last one of you. Perhaps together, we lost more than half of you combined.

"!!!"

Startled gasps and exclamations of shock resounded as Sage Pakhet allowed everyone, including the younger generations, to know about the extent of their plight.

"No way! How could a Sage like the Thief of a Million Stars steal from your sealed vaults? Not even you all could steal from yourself without extensive knowledge of your formations and arrays, including numerous secrets!"

This was an Original Magistrate who was a renowned Scholar who cultivated Enlightened Scholarly Mist and was the Dean of the #1 Academy within the Galaxy.

When he spoke, everyone listened. Moreover, his questioning resonated with their thoughts. While Teng Jiangwen was certainly an extraordinary thief and powerful cultivator, he had been forced to death by the eight Sages and was only a Sage himself! How could they possibly believe this?

The elderly woman Mystic Overlord chimed in,

"It does seem quite preposterous. A Sage stealing from all eight Sages without being caught? What were you all doing? Sitting on your asses while being robbed blind?! Are you simply telling us this so you all can shift the focus and prevent conflict? Spewing lies to secure your future interests?"

She was rather direct and this caused quite a few to be startled. Even Sage Pakhet sent a glare her way.

Sage Khonshu knew this would be the result. A wave of contentious questioning unfolded. It was clear that Sage Pakhet's admission of their incompetence was hard to swallow for the others.

The main, hard-to-explain point was that they had forced Teng Jiangwen to his death. Barely any of them knew that it was only because Earth-Saint Luo Ning had blocked two of Teng Jiangwen's strongest blows that he hadn't killed Sage Imentet outright and used that opportunity to depart. It was to the point where Teng Jiangwen, knowing that Luo Ning had killed him, had openly stated how much he hated her before self-detonating.

Sage Nepri's cultivation base had sustained severe damage, and without Mystic-Heaven grade or peak Mystic-World grade resources, she might have to spend ten thousand years or longer to recover back to her original state in secluded cultivation. She was teetering on the verge of being crippled.

Sage Imentet would have lost her life, and every last Heavenly Treasure in their possession had been damaged by those forceful fists thrown by Teng Jiangwen. They simply did not know how powerful Teng Jiangwen, a Sage with a Minor Authority, was, especially at the end.

Whoosh!

Whoosh!

Whoosh!

Several platforms fly to the center. They all carried the Sages of the Eight Regions, including Sage Shattered Sphinx.

Sage Hathor took the lead, her voice soft and gently sweeping across the hall.

"It is true."

"..."

Sage Hathor's words silenced every last one of them. While Sage Khonshu and Sage Pakhet might not be believed, Sage Hathor's reputation was stellar, and she was beloved by countless souls and often considered the sole saint of the Sages. When she made an admission, even the elderly Mystic Overlord and Academy's Dean could only grow silent, digesting this information.

Only after calming down did they finally think things through, realizing that the Sages would never be able to maintain the secret of keeping a galaxy's worth of resources. It would be almost impossible because the signs would be exposed almost immediately. They had no reason to ruin their image if they couldn't take advantage of this either.

Moreover, not all of them had sinister intentions, and those like Sage Hathor would never do such a despicable thing while Sage Pakhet's personality was always above-board and direct. She would rob openly rather than sneakily steal, and this reputation had followed her throughout her entire lifetime.

They could only, after a long, deeply depressing thought process, accept the truth: the Thief of a Million Stars had spared no one.

A young genius, a breathtakingly gorgeous young woman with a good head on her shoulders and great talent, said softly and bleakly in a room that was mostly silent that it felt like roaring thunder.

"What…do we do now?"

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