Xia De replied, "I can only promise to take your people back to the Perennial World and protect them from this catastrophe."

"What about the rest of the Fifth Mainland?" Lu Yin asked.

Xia De sighed. "As fellow humans, we would like to save them as well, but we simply can’t. Keeping the Perennial World safe is already considered acceptable. You should know that in the past there were the Six Mainlands, but now, only this broken Fifth Mainland remains. Even the Fifth Mainland will soon disappear. Humans are simply not Aeternus’s opponent. We can't help you."

Lu Yin’s smile had already disappeared. "It's a shame that people call you Hero Xia. You are actually meeker than anyone."

Xia De laughed. "I would willingly die to protect the Perennial World, but not this Forsaken Land. Lu Xiaoxuan, I know that you want to threaten us with the people you’ve captured, but you’re being too naive. A new child is born into the major families every few decades, or at worst, every few hundred years. The people that you’ve captured are not invaluable. Our bottom line is to allow your people to escape into the Perennial World. Forget about trying to drag us into this war.

"The Perennial World is humanity’s last line of defense. Why did Progenitor Hui deploy the Ceaseless Impetus sourcebox array in the Perennial World instead of here in the Fifth Mainland? Because he clearly foresaw that the Fifth Mainland would fall.”

Lu Yin lifted his head. "That’s...