1335 THE STRENGTH FOR INDEPENDENCE

Time passed in the blink of an eye and the second month rolled in. The Haima Tribe now had no Nascent soul realm members left. Everyone was at the Dao shell at the very minimum and even then they were in the minority.

Over seventy percent of the members were in the Dao Treading realm with the rest in the Dao Treading realm. But among all these, only Elder Niji was at the immortal realm.

~SHUA~

But soon, another change was felt.

“Seems like it is starting.” Elder Niji opened his eyes and looked at the back of the ship.

Lin Mu too, woke up from his cultivation and saw that Head Warrior Kulo was having a breakthrough.

~HONG~

A few minutes later, the man had successfully stepped into the Immortal Ascension realm!

“Congratulations head warrior Kulo.” Lin Mu praised.

“It is nothing, I just did as was expected of me.” Head warrior Kulo replied.

“Mmhmm, you should continue to do so. Now that you ares n the immortal Ascension realm, you should feel the bloodline of our tribe calling out to you soon enough.” Elder Niji suggested.

“I shall do that, yes.” Head Warrior Kulo sat back down, not wasting even a moment of time.

Lin Mu looked around the ship, finding everyone other than the humans hard at cultivating.

“Hmm... at least we haven’t had any problems with the convicts.” Lin Mu spoke.

“They’ve learned their place. Plus, they also know they would be dropping the Axe on their foot if they did anything. Even if they manage to take control of the ship, they can’t really sail very long. They don’t have any immortals strong enough to protect them from the beasts either.” Elder Niji replied.

“That’s true. And removing the more problematic ones back in the tribe was probably one of the reasons.” Lin Mu agreed.

“Some of them are also willing to follow the clan.” Immortal Taegu’s voice was heard from the front.

The man had calmed down a bit in the past two months, having gotten used to the sea as well as to the presence of Lin Mu and Elder Niji. He didn’t feel like he was walking on eggshells anymore, either.

“Oh?” Lin Mu raised a brow. “They are?”

“Yes. Many of them cannot return to their homes for obvious reasons, and some don’t have any homes left. Thus, they want to continue following the tribe. They have understood the situation of the tribe at this time as well.” Immortal Taegu explained.

“Hmm... that’s good.” Lin Mu was satisfied with this.

“Perhaps we can make use of them while interacting with other humans.” Elder Niji suggested.

This was one of the issues they were bound to happen soon enough. If the humans discovered them, or they themselves went to other humans, they were bound to question who they were.

And it would become hard to communicate when a majority of the tribe still didn’t speak fluent human tongue.

Then there were humans who would be bound to be interested in who they were and might even pry further.

This might be fine if the tribe was strong enough to endure all problems that came their way. But that time was still far. The members of the tribe were still getting strong and would continue to do so.

But to reach the level of proper independence and selfsufficiency, they needed to have several immortals within their midst.

Lin Mu had pondered about this a lot while also discussing with elder Niji, immortal Taegu and Kunzi. He first understood what the average strength of the kingdoms and the number of immortals they might have was.

While they couldn’t really tell how many first, second, third or fourth tribulation immortals they had, they could estimate the number of fifth tribulation immortals or higher.

The survival rate of a cultivator went down after each tribulation and thus the numbers would decrease the higher their cultivation went.

Thus, the fifth tribulation was somewhat of a watershed. All the experts at that level and higher were the backbone of the kingdoms.

Those at the fifth tribulation realm were the very elite soldiers of the kingdoms and empires, while those at the sixth tribulation realm were enough to be generals and kings.

As for the seventh tribulation stage, that was the peak that could be achieved here. The total number of seventh tribulation immortals was said to be less than twenty in the entire Rust Sky world, but there might be other hidden experts.

‘At least ten thousand first tribulation immortals, five thousand second tribulation immortals, one thousand third tribulation immortals, two hundred fourth tribulation immortals, fifty fourth tribulation immortals, ten sixth tribulation immortals and one seventh tribulation immortal.’ Lin Mu recalled the average strength of a kingdom. Published by Nôv'elD/rama.Org.

If the Haima tribe were to truly go against them all, they needed to be at this level.

It was certainly not something that could be achieved in a short amount of time, but it was a goal they would have to aim for.

~Sigh~

“Better take this in short strides... no use in over thinking.” Lin Mu muttered to himself.

~SPLASH~

And just as he thought about that, a loud splash could be heard in the distance.

“LAND! I SEE LAND!” A few of the humans shouted.

Lin Mu immediately looked at the horizon, discovering a vague silhouette. It was almost evening, thus it was hard to see what it was clearly. But a few minutes later, it became clear enough.

“An island!” Immortal Taegu said with excitement.

“Let me check what it is...” Lin Mu quickly accessed the navigation and found what the island was.

“Huh... it is an unnamed island. There are also no humans living on it.” Lin Mu said, his eyes brightening.

“Great! Shall we land there?” Immortal Taegu asked.

“I think we ca—” But just as Lin Mu was about to give his permission, he paused. “TURN BACK!” he shouted.

~SHUA~

But before they could do anything, the sea and air in front of them flickered and a tall rift opened up!